I'd really like to be attending the Web 2.0 conference right now. It's not in the cards for me at the moment though, so I'll be living vicariously through blogs & friends. Looks like they've got a fantastic lineup of speakers and topics. I also like how open-ended everything appears (at least from the literature).

A number of folks have been associating Amazon Light 4 with Web 2.0 / Web as Platform. In my opinion, it's only a baby-step in that direction. Most of the connections I built to other services are rather lightweight, and most (Gmail, del.icio.us, dropcash, etc.) take advantage of a simple open-ended input system (forms that pre-populate fields based on querystring). A real interconnection of web services would be much more integrated and aware.

For example, if you were viewing a page about a Nikon D70 camera, it would be great to see (in the same page) if this item were on any of your friends' wishlists (better yet - if they had had one purchased for them), if Flickr had some nice photos taken with that camera, what the lowest price from Froogle/MySimon is, available Digital Camera books from your Local Library, a link to the manufacturer's home page, latest news about the D70 (recalls/firmware updates), etc. Sure there are stumbling blocks, and a lot of this would be hard work, but the coolest bit about it is there aren't any sort of Show-Stopping roadblocks. The biggest concern I'd have moving forward is not how many connections can we find and cram into an app, but what are the best and most useful connections to the end user.

Case in point - I tried hard to figure out a good way to integrate Flickr's API with Amazon Light 4.0, but could not. There weren't many appropriate crossovers in my opinion. The only connection between a storefront (Amazon) and a social sharing experience (Flickr) that I could find was the cameras being used to take the photos. But, to be frank, the cameras being used are almost irrelevant - except in a few cases, (and Camera Types aren't exposed fully in the current Flickr API). So I chose to not include Flickr for the moment, though I wish I could have (I am still a big fan and wish them well).

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