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People have hardly got used to the concept of Web 2.0 then suddenly you came up with a term called Web 3.0 and shortly Web 4.0. What is the logic behind versioning the Internet?

My proposal is that we use these terms to index decades of the Web. Web 1.0 was 1990 – 2000 and the focus was mainly about the backend of the Web (HTML, http). Web 2.0 is 2000 – 2010 and has been mainly about the front-end of the Web (usability, AJAX, tagging, etc.). Web 3.0 will be 2010 – 2020 and will be about the backend again (RDF, Sparql and the Semantic Web) – it will upgrade the content of the Web. Web 4.0 will be from 2020 – 2030 and will be about the front-end again – a smarter, more proactive and productive Web in which apps will be able to reason and help users intelligently.

To me Web 3.0 seems like a mixture of social software and Semantic Web combining the principles of socially generated content and semantic interoperability. Could you agree on this? What is your explanation?

Yes I agree that Web 3.0 will combine the Semantic Web with social media, enabling a new generation of richer, more shareable, mashable content.

So where does the Semantic Web come in? Could it be that the W3C’s concept of a Semantic Web (despite its greatness) is too purist, too technology centred, which finally makes it difficult when it comes to outreach?

I think that the W3C’s original vision of the Semantic Web focused mainly on the value to software. But the Semantic Web will also be valuable to end-users, publishers, advertisers, buyers & sellers. The end-user benefits were not emphasized or even illustrated very much in the original vision. But that makes sense – the W3C is mainly focused on open standards for software. Today those of us who are promoting Web 3.0 are really focusing more on the benefits of semantics to end-users – regular non-technical end-users. That is ultimately the most important story to tell in order to bring about mainstream adoption.

Your company Radar Networks is still operating in stealth mode but a lot of people are really curious what it will reveal later this year. So what is behind the curtains? How will you apply the Web 3.0 principles in your products?

Well we’re in stealth as you point out so I can’t say so much yet. But we’re trying to bring the Semantic Web to ordinary non-technical end-users. Our application is a hosted Web-based service that will enable anyone to build and share their own Semantic website.

About Nova Spivack

Mr. Spivack has a BA in Philosophy, with a focus on cognitive science and artificial intelligence, from Oberlin College and a CSS degree from the International Space University a NASA-funded graduate professional business school for the space industry. In 1999 Mr. Spivack’s interest in space gave him the opportunity to help pioneer the early days of space tourism when he flew to the edge of space with Space Adventures and did micro-gravity parabolic flight training with the Russian air force.

Mr. Spivack’s weblog, Minding the Planet, focuses on Radar Networks and emerging technologies and can be read at http://www.mindingtheplanet.net.

A full version of his biography can be found here.