Web 2.0 business models are about competing on ideas, not on resources. Yet over 70% of most startup development effort goes into undifferentiated “heavy lifting”! Innovation continues at a mind-bending pace, and this presentation will showcase some thought-provoking new directions that Web Services are headed in. The presentation will include a Web Service that allows computers to make requests of people, and more.

Amazon spent ten years and over $1 billion developing a world-class technology and content platform that powers Amazon web sites for millions of customers every day. Most people think “Amazon.com” when they hear the word; however Web 2.0 practitioners are excited to learn that there is a separate technology arm of the company, known as Amazon Web Services or AWS. Using AWS, developers can build software applications leveraging the same robust, scalable, and reliable technology that powers Amazon’s retail business. AWS has now launched eleven services with open APIs for developers to build applications, with the result that over 200,000 developers have registered on Amazon’s developer site to create applications based on these services.