ABSTRACT

New technologies and services, so-called Web 2.0 tools, such as wikis, weblogs, podcasts, folksonomies, file sharing and virtual online worlds, are changing their users’ handling of data, information and knowledge. The new Web technology not only gives users access to a vast amount of data, information and knowledge, it also breaks with the distinction between consumers and producers of knowledge. Web 2.0 gives people the opportunity to contribute information, which then might be a small but nevertheless relevant piece in the collective development of knowledge. When people contribute information others might rely on it, link it to other contributions or even modify it. In an interactive process, the collective can make use of anybody’s contribution and shape it in such a way that it fits the needs of the community. Through such collaborative processes the community can enhance its knowledge base and build new knowledge. But it is not only the community that learns, it is also the individual that benefits and whose knowledge is expanded. In mass collaboration with Web 2.0 tools these individual and collective processes of learning and knowledge building are greatly intertwined.