THE LATEST THINKING

What is the Internet and where is it heading? What is the Web and how is it different from the Internet?

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP) to serve billions of users world-wide. It consists of millions of private, public, academic, business, and government networks linked by a broad array of electronic and optical networking technologies. Its function is to carry a vast array of information resources and services to its users.

The Web on the other hand, is a system of interlinked hypertext documents contained on the Internet. Using a web browser, anyone can now view web pages that may contain a combination of content forms – text, still images, sound, animation, videos, graphics and other interactivity content to convey information using this hyperlinked system.

The Internet and the Web – although separate and distinct tools that work together, derive their utility when people make use of it. The networking technologies that drive the engine of the Internet are ever increasingly becoming sophisticated and evolving at a fast pace. On the other hand, innovative software technologies that drive the Web enable making the management of people’s daily lives and businesses more mundane than ever before.

During the very early stages of the Internet, when the first web browsers were just being introduced, communications was characteristically a one-way text-based affair. The most significant application integrated at that time was electronic mail (email). You would write and send one and wait for a reply. Websites too were pretty much one-dimensional during those early years.

Today, because of ever increasing human interaction and innovations the characteristics of the Web and the Internet are merging. 

DEGREE OF TRUST

You may have noticed that there is now a prevalence of websites on the Web that increasingly rely on user participation, user interaction and user-generated content. After all, humans are social beings. They communicate. They tell or listen to stories. They have conversations. Yet, this contrasts markedly from an unbelievable number of websites that still contain a collection of hyperbole, artificial branding and pro-corporate content. As a result, trusted decisions are being made on other locations on the Internet.

Research tells us that the highest degree of trust comes from those ‘like me’. Most people canvass around for ideas before making decisions – mostly from their peers or from websites they trust. So how do you build up the most trust?

IT’S PEOPLE THAT MATTER

The fusion of the Internet, the Web and multimedia communication devices are together are simply nothing more than tools for people to navigate around cyberspace. But, getting to know and hear from people who use the technologies are what’s becoming more important these days.

The InterWeb will happen only when there is also a more complete integration of corporate, institutional and social websites. The user experience will radically be different too. But in what way?

If people and their individual voices and experiences are what matter, we’ll be seeing consumers help write the corporate newsletter, product or service brochures, feeds pulling in industry blogs, media customers rating and ranking and voting for what features they want improved, product teams working directly with customers in real-time, and customers self-supporting each other. 

ARE YOU SAVVY?

Savvy marketer (of almost anything under the sun) will allow content to appear from peers, customers, and the market at large. The will take any feedback and demonstrate in public how one can improve offerings in plain view.

This means providing analysis of not just by, but from competitors as well. That level of openness will make you more relevant and trust will increase. How? It will be obvious to many that the only voice won’t be the marketing one.

The most effective websites will contain balanced points-of-view from a host of different domains that include yours, the search engines, web tools that include podcasts, forums and blogs, analyst sites, and even from mobile devise users accessing the Internet.

This may all sound disruptive at first but because marketing and communications are to-gether spreading out in the same direction where stories and conversations are oc-curring, it all soon will make sense to have those same things come under one’s own roof.

It will be a new space where people, whether they be fans, customers, prospects, stakeholders, community members, employees, plain folks and even detractors mix to-gether, churning up new members and viral activity.

This is what the InterWeb will be.