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The Self-Organizing Web

One Web, an Infinity of Spiders

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The Web Was Done by Amateurs

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Abstract

One of the beauties of the Web is its lack of centralized control and the possibility for anyone to contribute content and functionalities. The Web is therefore a self-organizing system. In this chapter, we look at the Web through the lenses of self-organization and its implications on the Web’s growth, structure, success, and ways of searching for information.

I don’t need Google. My wife knows everything.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    NetCraft and Internet Live Stats; retrieved from: http://www.internetlivestats.com/total-number-of-websites/.

  2. 2.

    http://www.worldwidewebsize.com.

  3. 3.

    The characteristic path length is the median of the average of the minimum distance between any two nodes of the graph.

  4. 4.

    Personal communication.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Stuttgart, Stuttgart, Germany

    Marco Aiello

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  1. Marco Aiello
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Aiello, M. (2018). The Self-Organizing Web. In: The Web Was Done by Amateurs. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90008-7_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90008-7_9

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-90007-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-90008-7

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