ABSTRACT
The term Web 2.0 was initially popularized by O’Reilly Associates in 2004 to reflect changes in the ways in which the World Wide Web was being deployed, and has subsequently come to stand for what is a potentially revolutionary change in the nature of the Internet. Web 2.0 extends the traditional Web by employing an architecture of participation that goes way beyond following hyperlinks. In this next generation of networked services a website is used as a platform for others to extend or edit content or services, instead of simply disseminating information created by a webmaster. Examples of Web 2.0 applications include social networking sites, video sharing and podcast sites, wikis, blogs and folksonomies. Such websites are designed to work in a social, collective and participatory manner, as is the open source software that underpins their development. Such software is increasingly being used in the development of cartography and mapping services, and a number of Web 2.0 mapping applications are active across the Internet.
