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The discussion over “who owns what?”, and particularly content on the Web will become more and more intense in the months to come. Some of the major news outlets have already begun their campaigns to monetize or at least limit who uses their content. The days where a trackback or just traffic pays for the use of content on the Web would appear to be drawing to a close. I am struggling with what the far reaching indications of these actions by Reuters, The New York Times, AP and others who want to charge for “sniffing” their pages might be, but it is clear that revenue is at the heart of the matter.

My inclination is to believe that the “bean counters” are finally owning up to the fact that ad revenue on the Web is not what it needs to be. In our own experiences, both as a PR company and as intense users of the Web, is that people simply do not click on ads any more. I know, this is a not brainer isn’t it? At the other end of the spectrum are the people who built Web 2.0 and still have a vision of a free and rather open standard dynamic platform. We work with several companies who are dedicated to both transparency and “real data” portability - notably JS-Kit and Secondbrain .

Interestingly, these two just collaborated to solve an immediate problem for a contest Secondbrain has been conducting. Khris Loux CEO of JS-Kit and Secondbrain CEO Lars Teirgen worked with one another in integrating JS-Kit’s Score widget into the Secondbrain platform in order to allow Secondbrain users to vote for the winners of the contest . Though there is no huge user generated content aspect involved here, the portability of JS-Kit tools is evidenced in that Lars’s team can choose to either retain or stop using the Score aspect for their purposes without penalty of content loss or tech time to remove the tool.

Open Standards And Web 3.0

In extensive conversations with Khris Loux and other notable Internet experts, one common theme or “war” becomes apparent. There is a small unnoticed war going on behind the scenes - the war between people who want a decentralized and democratic Web and those that would gather all the power to themselves in a sort of “traditional” approach to what we might call “The TV of the Future” or the Web. It is already obvious that traditional models of monetization are being applied to what we lovingly thought of as Web 2.0. I expect most of us half expected this all along, but these latest “ham handed segues” by online traditional media (NYT, Reuters and etc.) should be evidence. According to Loux;

“Widgets and other distributive technologies are beginning to drive an aspect of the Internet, and the business implications of this are potentially staggering. The control, ownership and portability of user generated, advertiser and publisher generated content are paramount issues for the future of the Web.”

I don’t know how much better anyone can state this issue than this, but certainly Web 2.0 and its derivatives hinge in the balance in as far as what we “the users” get out of it. If you cannot see this, then just think about who owns or what is presented to you on television. Perhaps readers might also look into the “not so limited” opinion out there besides mine too, or even the prima fascia evidence .

Just how did that information broadcast conduit change and how does this bear on your Internet? For their part Secondbrain, JS-Kit, Particls (and innovation of my friend Chris Saad), Wikipedia (Jimmy’s thing) and a host of other groundbreaking developments of Web 2.0 have broken the ground for the future of people who can use the Internet for fantastic visions. In the end, the quality of life that something impacts is all that matters to any of us.

So here it is, which side of the fence do you really belong on? Yes, we represent Secondbrain and JS-Kit, but your question might be better focused on the “why” of the people we are behind. I have iterated the solution to this question 1000 times at least with no BS involved. Web 3.0 is in the balance, what will it look like - open or closed? Jimmy, you and O’Reilly showed us the way, so you guys ride herd on them doggies at the NYT’s.