What is Web 3.0?

Web 1.0 - Finding the Static Web

Superclean has been in the web business since 1995. Websites then were merely informational - for example, our early snowboarding + windsurfing websites displayed products and not much else. The masses were still learning how to send email. Streaming music sounded underwater. Video? Click the download button, go fix a sandwich, and wait.

There were many search engines like Lycos, Alta Vista, and Hotbot... but directories like Yahoo! were the best place to make sense of the world wide web. Then one day in our San Francisco office, Dave showed us his high school friend's new project: Google.com. (Poor Dave... he stuck with us instead of being employee #11 at Google!)

Looking back, this (to me) marked the transformation to the next phase. The web was growing so quickly that we needed new ways to make sense of it.

Web 2.0 - Searching The Interactive Web

The next web became much more dynamic and interactive. Websites ***know*** you, and social media networks like MySpace and Facebook became worlds unto themselves. There's a pretty good argument that these powerful networks (how many people do you know who can't seem to navigate outside Facebook?) managed to centralize what was once a wonderfully fragmented internet.

Google emerged as the dominant tool for making sense of the web. It's now part of our vernacular. Microsoft's Bing is far behind and Yahoo!'s directory is barely relevant. Because at least 2/3's of today's traffic comes from Google searches, we must play by their rules. We don't know the exact recipe (that's some valuable IP!) but we get a lot of guidance and access to powerful tools to help improve the quality of search engine rankings. It's an ever changing recipe and it's our job to keep up with it.

Web 3.0 - Search Evolves into Contextual (or Semantic.. or Intelligent) Web

Searches are getting smarter and more contextual as they shift to mobile and voice. Google understands your intent! Thanks to AI-powered assistants such as Siri, Alexa, Google and Cortana, search queries become more conversational. Appealing to these new AI's means taking a deeper look at your content and adding another layer of structured data, or schema, to help search engines better understand and display your content.

Essentially, the emerging standards of Web 3.0 mean a semantic web with linked data and powerful applications but in a more secure and private way.

This space is moving quickly. Being on top of this emerging technology is a great opportunity to bring QUALITY, RELEVANT traffic to your website and build value and authority. This is crucial for the next phase of the web... the Internet of Value.

The Internet of Value

Decentralized applications, blockchain and distributed ledger technologies, cryptocurrencies and tokenized assets, so-called smart contracts, artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and internet of things (IoT) are all bringing a new dimension of value to the internet. Value can transfer and transform in almost-instant, frictionless ways like never before... empowering people and organizations like never before. We are about to witness massive leaps in everything from logistics and supply chain management to scientific research and perhaps a less centrally-controlled financial system.

Many aspects of Web 3.0 are already here but not quite the forefront. It is crucial to consider this evolution to build long-lasting value on the world wide web because everything is moving forward.