Four Stages in the Internet of Things - Kevin Kelly -- The Te...

What happens here is that after linking and sharing computers, then linking and sharing documents, we are linking and sharing data in those documents. We are sharing and linking the subjects and meaning of what those documents are about.

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In fact, you could think of this stage as the World Wide Database.

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Another tremendously unappreciated enabling technology is the API. This gateway allows controlled sharing of vast archives of data, unleashing the data's power via the usual network effects -- the more that use it the more valuable it becomes.

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But learning how to share data is what the next web will be about. Those who are able to let go and understand that all the real value in this next stage will be built on the emergent value that comes from deep interlinking, deep interconnecting, and freely (as is reasonable) releasing your precious data, those will be the technologies and organizations who gain the most. 

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That fourth stage is the drift towards linking up the things themselves. You want all the data about a thing to be embedded into the thing.

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What we ultimately want is an internet of things.

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An operational Semantic Web, or World Wide Database, or Giant Global Graph, or Web  3.0, will make possible millions of seemingly smarter services. I  won't have to re-tell each website who my friends are; once will be enough. If my name shows up in text, it will know it's me.

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The apparent smarter nature of the web will be due to the fact that the web will "know" more. Not in a conscious way, but in a programatic way. Concepts and items represented on the web will point to each other and know about each other -- in a fundamental way they do not right now.

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If the web knows you are always you, who are you? If the price of total personal service is total personal transparency, is that any different than total personal surveillance?

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I'm counting on the fact that kids will love it.

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