A long long time ago (OK, it was February 2006) I wrote about Web 2.0 in a post called Thoughts on Ajax/Atlas - 9: My $0.02 on Web 2.0.  What was fascinating to me -- and lots of others -- about Web 2.0 was the interesting ways that people were driving value out of their data.  I spoke with a lot of customers in 2006 about Web 2.0; I emphasized that it was really important to figure out how and what unique data their proposed application would capture.  I reminded them that the genius of Amazon wasn't just a great online retail experience (something other eventually copied), but how they mined their data to provide a differentiated experience (the Amazon ratings and recommendations still can't be beat to this day).  And Google wasn't just a great search algorithm (which it was and still is) but it was also about how they mined their search data.

Even with that though, I was totally blown away by GoogleFlu.  Basically, they've taken their search data and used it to monitor the progression of the flu through the United States.  You can read about how it works here including a great animated graph that shows how their monitoring is about 2 weeks ahead of the Center for Disease Control (CDC).  It's really amazing that there's such a strong correlation between people search for 'flu' on the web, and the actual rates of flu infection in the community [note, the algorithm to make the correlation is likely much more sophisticated]. 

Wow!  Now that's Web 2.0.  And it's a little bit scary... :)  What else are they watching????

By the way, this little tidbit was brought to me by TED (see TED - One of my favorite sites out there).  Google.org is headed by Larry Brilliant who was a 2006 TED Prize winner...