Intro-fodder

The group was chartered to look at ". understand the systems and technologies that permit the description and identification of people, groups, organizations, and user-generated content in extensible and privacy-respecting ways. The underlying assumption of the working group has been that these systems and technology underlie what we are begging to call the Social Web.

The phenomenon of the Social Web is bigger than standards. The Social Web vision is that the familiar mechanisms of communication and interaction available through social network applications will become a

Throughout the Incubator Activity, decisions have been taken via consensus during regular telephone conferences and occasional face to face meetings.

We have deliberately taken a very broad approach in our definition of the Social Web. We have looked at a range of existing and emerging technologies and practices. Many of these are cataloged in this report. In addition, the XG has analyzed the gap between the currently available standards and what would be required in order to fulfil the social web vision. Finally, we have sought to make recommendations to W3C on what its role should be in the emerging Social Web ecosystem.