WWW Recycling for a Better World
Stefano Ferretti
1
, Marco Furini
2
, Claudio E. Palazzi
∗3
, Marco Roccetti
1
, Paola Salomoni
1
Web 2.0 is affecting the structure of our society by creating new spaces of freedom, giving voice
to any opinion, easing interpersonal relationships, and encouraging the creation of collaborating col-
lectivities. Technologies such as blog, podcasting, wiki, and news feeds have the power to transform
every user from a mere information consumer to a potential producer, from a spectator to an actor.
The success of YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, and Wikipedia is under everybody’s eyes. Generally
speaking, Web 2.0 is seen as a powerful tool that, by exploiting Internet technologies, supplies services
to the society, helping the entire socio-cultural system to develop and to move toward a demo cratic
direction.
Unfortunately, this imagery is partially distorted: first, Web 2.0 and Internet technologies are
differently accessible by different parts of the society and, second, as many sociologists pointed out,
their applications often appeal to users’ egoistic purposes and self-celebration spirit [1]. Although we
cannot dismiss the value of current Web 2.0 applications, we are convinced that there is a much more
valuable potential that has not been exploited yet. By comparing the immense benefits that Web 2.0
could bring to the whole society, with its factual employment, one could provocatively change the
meaning of the acronym WWW into World Wide Waste. We are hence convinced that it is necessary
to redesign the utilization paradigm of Web 2.0 and, in general, of the Internet in order to recycle
∗
Corresponding author. E-Mail: cpalazzi@math.unipd.it
1
Dipartimento Scienze dell’Informazione - Universit`a di Bologna, Mura Anteo Zamboni 7, 40127 Bologna, Italy.
Email: {sferrett, roccetti, salomoni}@cs.unibo.it
2
Dipartimento di Informatica - Universit`a del Piemonte-Orientale, Via Bellini 25/G, 15100 Alessandria, Italy. Email:
furini@mfn.unipmn.it
3
Dipartimento di Matematica Pura ed Applicata - Universit`a di Padova, Via Trieste 63, 35121 Padova, Italy. Email:
cpalazzi@math.unipd.it
1
unused parts of Web 2.0 into altruistic bricks that could be appropriately rerouted and composed for
alternative, unselfish employment.
AN UNEXPLOITED POTENTIAL
In this article, we provide guidelines for a new interpretation of potentialities cocooned by Web 2.0
technologies: by finding and recycling unutilized resources over the Internet, it is possible to create an
integrated platform that reroutes them toward an altruistic use. To create a more powerful platform,
both hardware and software entities are considered as “resources” (e.g., data, programs, processor’s
cycles, storage capacity, cameras, communication capabilities). This integrated platform, along with
a simple graphical interface that hides all the technological difficulties, would help creating and devel-
oping novel services and applications that were not originally provided by either sources. Therefore,
the platform would increase the social solidarity and favor the establishment of “a better world”, as
provocatively announced in the title.
Before presenting the new interpretation of Web 2.0 potentialities, let us analyze why the current
vision of Web 2.0, as a powerful tool for the development of the entire society, may be questioned.
First of all, Internet technologies at the core of Web 2.0 are differently accessible by different parts
of the society. This might create social discrimination between who has access to these technologies and
who has not [2, 3]. This phenomenon (known as digital divide) is mainly due to: linguistic marginaliza-
tion (e.g., illiteracy impedes the approach to information); structure marginalization (e.g., unavailable
resources can deny the use of technology); technological marginalization (e.g., continuous technological
modernization can be problematic for economic-cultural reasons); and social marginalization (e.g., peo-
ple affected by physical or health problems are excluded from the use of many technologies). Although
not new, this phenomenon is nowadays particularly critical, as many sociologists agree that the current
Information Society is in the phase where the development of particular applications (e.g., Web 2.0)
can generate a mutation of the society itself [4].
Secondly but not in order of importance, the success of Web 2.0 mainly attracts applications
motivated by ego-centered behaviors (e.g., enrichment and self-celebration). It is worth noting that
there is a long sociological and philosophical debate concerning whether a simple action can be seen
as altruism or egoism (is it egoism or altruism to have a dog? is it egoism or altruism to write a book
review on a website?) [5]. Far from settling this debate, we simply observe that the vast potential of
Web 2.0 technologies is far from being largely exploited.
2
At the base of this technology’s waste there is the fact that we are still mislead by the belief that
means are neutral in principle and that it is their use that makes them positive or negative. This is
a naive interpretation; instead, our ambitious goal is to generate an integrated platform that could
be resilient to a pure egoistic use. This platform will capture unutilized resources and reroute them
toward an altruistic use.
We can consider this platform as a manager of resources that can be located all over the world; its
aim is that of retrieving and combining them when needed so as to provide altruistic services.
The idea is that even a selfish use of the technology, in order to achieve personal objectives or to
have fun, can be rerouted by a layer devoted to the management and diffusion of collective resources
so as to make emerging an altruistic purpose. To factually deploy such a platform, five main steps are
required:
1. Integrate the most widely used communication platforms, Internet, mobile, and television, to
generate a global broadband and broadcast communication scenario, able to guarantee to every
member of the society an easy access to information independently from the used device.
2. Deploy a system able to collect and organize (categorize) resources made available by the various
users, and to have them utilizable in case of (altruistic) need.
3. Motivate p otential users, even through selfish advantages, so that they will subscribe the system
and render available part of their resources in case of need for an altruistic aim.
4. Provide a programmable environment so that the development of altruistic applications would
be as easy as using a single integrated tool.
5. Create new altruistic services and applications, by which categorized resources can be used for
social purposes thanks also to their diffusion in various contexts.
PRACTICAL CASE STUDIES
As representative examples, two case studies follow (also depicted in Figure 1), showing how a careful
and integrated use of new technologies permits the development of new altruistic applications.
Example 1. Remote monitoring of sick people is an application more and more diffused. Think of
a remotely monitored patient who experiences a sudden and unexpected worsening of his health con-
ditions while walking in a park. The arrival of doctors called by the remote monitoring station could
3
Figure 1: Exemplars of altruistic applications deployable thanks to the proposed integrated platform.
be not timely enough. Instead, it would be more effective to also exploit the various devices owned
by people in the surroundings to propagate the aid-request until reaching the smart phone of a doctor
in the neighborhood, who could promptly take action while waiting for the ambulance. Therefore,
paradoxically, a runner who goes jogging for personal interest becomes an altruistic subject by putting
on hand his fancy technological resources (e.g., the communication capabilities of his iPhone).
Example 2. Consider a crisis scene in a city, e.g., a street accident or a terrorist attack. In this
scenario, it would be useful to provide first responders with real-time pictures/videos of the emergency
while still driving toward the crisis area. Devices utilized for this purpose could be security cameras
in the area or any other camera-endowed device (e.g., a cellphone) possessed by people in proximity of
the emergency area. Both commands to activate the device and generated pictures/videos can be sent
through the vehicular network directly to the vehicle of first responders, or reach them through the
Internet and the cellular network. In any case, elements that are typically considered of disturbance in
emergency situations (e.g., vehicles that increase the traffic and slow down the arrival of ambulances,
“curious” people who typically interfere with aid operations) can turn out to be of help.
4
To practically explain how to include a selfish application into our altruistic vision, we consider two
selfish applications showing how they can be part of a wider, altruistic aim.
Selfish application 1. Ad-Torrent is a digital billboard system that provides users with location
based advertisement messages (Ads), guided by a particular keyword search [6]. This application
operates by executing three main tasks: search, query dissemination, and content delivery. In essence,
a company in a certain area can generate Ads (associated with keywords and metatags), then put
them on air via the Ad-Torrent system. Potential customers in the nearby will receive these Ads if
their profiles match those of the Ads. Clearly, potential customers have to subscribe the Ad-Torrent
application providing keywords and tags that identify their profiles (i.e., interests, description of their
electronic equipments, working experience, etc.).
Selfish application 2. New devices are more and more frequently endowed with communication
capabilities. These communication capabilities could be exploited, for instance, to protect one’s patri-
mony. As an example, in case of alarm a security camera could be remotely controlled from a smart
phone to carefully check a certain area. Moreover, a lost or stolen digital camera (or a camera endowed
phone) could be remotely controlled to transmit back its position, stored personal pictures, or even
new pictures just taken from its current location.
In their attempt to reach new customers for companies and to protect one’s patrimony, these two
applications can be considered as “selfish”. Yet, they can be enhanced to serve also an altruistic
purpose and, to demonstrate this point, we revisit examples 1 and 2.
Example 1 revisited. The general (altruism-fostering) platform attracts users because of the services
that provides or just because people know that by joining it they might help somebody else; we hence
assume that the sick guy, the other people at the park, and the doctor in the nearby have all subscribed
the altruistic service. The sick guy has done so because he is aware that it may help him in finding
quicker aid in case of necessity. People at the park have done so because they can receive Ads for
products or shows that they might be interested in, or just because they run a company and would
like to spread some Ads around through the aforementioned selfish application 1. The latter was also
5
