Web Annotation: The Web’s Conversation Layer

Lyza Gardner

Cloud Four

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Web Annotation—now a W3C standard—aims to establish a conversation layer on top of the web. By theoretically allowing anyone to annotate any web page content, it’s an ennobling premise and thoroughly web-like: democratic, open and standardized. But with this freedom comes challenges. Content publishers are faced with an anxiety-inducing lack of control over what people say about their content. And nothing in the standard itself protects against conversations devolving into troll-hijacked chaos. The evolution of Web Annotation mirrors that of the Web itself, in miniature, facing off with some of the same big themes of identity, security, authority and freedom.

Lyza likes figuring out how to do things. In turn, she likes to teach others how to do new things, too. Writer for O’Reilly, A List Apart, Smashing Magazine, NET Magazine and co-founder of Cloud Four, Lyza advocates for elegant standards, education and compassion in pursuit of the best possible future Web. Building on over 20 years of web experience, Lyza’s current focuses include JavaScript-powered IoT, platform standards stewardship, Web APIs and progressive web applications. Her latest book is JavaScript on Things: A Web Developer’s Introduction to Electronics (Manning).