Releasing the Web

There's a lot of talk about at the moment about Web 3.0.

Hang on! I've only just really started to understand what Web 2.0 is (and I use the word "understand" in its loosest terms). I challenge anyone to put down what it means in a sentence which actually makes sense. And what happened to the minor releases? Anyone stuck on Web 2.1.2.006 and unable to upgrade directly due to database incompatibilities?

At a recent awards conference attended by a number of VCs, a colleague of mine spent a day walking the halls and listening out for buzzwords, then very smartly tweaked his presentation at the last minute. At presentation time, an otherwise fascinating talk with several slides courtesy of one "Rob Newby" (a respected security professional), had the following words and phrases liberally dropped in: "The Semantic Web", "Web 3.0", "data-centric"

The slavering crowd went wild for this young entrepreneur's use of words, and he was approached after the meeting by no less than 3 VCs professing an interest in the product. I'm delighted of course, the Semantic Web I just about "get" for now, and my love of data-centrism is by now reknowned, but I've looked everywhere I can for a definitive explanation of Web 3.0, and there isn't one.

In my experience most software becomes mature round about the 4th major release. 4.0 releases are usually trumpeted as the big step forwards (although I usually wait for 4.1). By that time most of the really crazy bugs are wheedled out, customers have given valuable feedback and hopefully you (and by 'you' I mean 'I') are left with a saleable piece of software that actually represents value for money in some regard.

I think I'll wait for Web 4.0, that'll be really good.