What does web 2.0 means to the users ?

This is one question which raises in my mind frequently these days. Every day there is a new startup and everyday the garage filled up with a new idea or a betterment sort. There is a truck load of information we can find across all the street corners of the web.

Has any one took hold of the market or does it need more time to evolve? Are we designing anything which centers society and social welfare? Do we really have time to explore new applications or are we wasting our valuable time before the PC.

One thing i could see is that there are lot of blogs made about many yet another web 2.0. How much the IT majors fund/invest on these startups? Does it open new IT oppurtunities? Does technology and application ideas flow parallel to complement each other?

How much time can we effectively(recommended) spend on a web 2.0 in an average? This question is irrelevant to the geeks or the developers. But it’s most relevant to the average consumer of the services of web 2.0.

There are more serious question waiting to be posted on these web 2.0 companies and service providers.