If the world-wide trend continues, 'Web 3.0' will be tightly monitored, and will become an unprecedented tool for surveillance. The "Internet of Things", a digital representation of real world objects and people tagged with RFID chips, and increased censorship are two main themes for the future of the web.

The future of the internet, according to author and "web critic" Andrew Keen, will be monitored by "gatekeepers" to verify the accuracy of information posted on the web. The "Outlook 2009" report from the November-December issue of The Futurist reports that,

"Internet entrepreneur Andrew Keen believes that the anonymity of today's internet 2.0 will give way to a more open internet 3.0 in which third party gatekeepers monitor the information posted on Web sites to verify its accuracy."

Keen stated during his early 2008 interview with The Futurist that the internet, in its current form, has undermined mainline media and empowered untrustworthy "amateurs", two trends that he wants reversed. "Rather than the empowerment of the amateur, Web 3.0 will show the resurgence of the professional," states Keen.

Australia has now joined China in implementing mandatory internet censorship, furthering the trend towards a locked down and monitored web.
http://www.oldthinkernews.com/Articles/oldthinker%20news/eu_set_to_move.htm

Smartdust is the term used to describe a network of tiny wireless microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) sensors, robots, or devices, installed with wireless communications, that can detect (for example) light, temperature, or vibration.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smartdust

This project finished in 2001, but many additional projects have grown out of it. Among these are

* Berkeley Webs
* NEST
* Center for Embedded and Networked Sensing at UCLA

If you are interested in academic research in the TinyOS area, you should check out the TinyOS web site and Crossbow Technologies.

If you are interested in commercial applications of the technology, you should check out Dust Networks, the company that was created to commerciallize this technology.
http://robotics.eecs.berkeley.edu/~pister/SmartDust/

Internet of Things
http://www.future-internet.eu/fileadmin/documents/madrid_documents/FISO/3b._Internet_of_Services_and_Internet_of_Things_Panel_-_Telefonica.pdf

Dust Networks, the leader in standards-based intelligent wireless sensor networking (WSN), provides ultra low-power, highly reliable embedded systems to the world’s leading sensor manufacturers – market visionaries who recognize that “smart dust” embedded inside their sensors is the start of a paradigm shift in their market.

SmartMesh Products combine Dust Networks' Intelligent Networking Platform with the company's extremely low power radio technology, providing solutions that are easy to integrate and simple to deploy.
http://www.dustnetworks.com/

Another leader in the space...
http://www.xbow.com/

We need to build an integrated architecture that would enable organizations to share physical data collected by wireless sensor networks.

Jan. 18, 2009—The EPCglobal network, often called the "Internet of Things," was developed to allow companies to use Electronic Product Code standards to track goods in the supply chain with radio frequency identification and share related data over the Internet. Now that we can track objects, industry and research communities are interested in using wireless sensor networks (WSNs) to capture and process information about physical environments, such as temperature, humidity, pressure and vibration. But WSNs tend to be developed as isolated networks for individualized applications, and there is no way to share the collected sensory information.
http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/4554/1/82/

Arming Big Brother...
http://www.quaker.org/qcea/intergroup/Report%20of%20big%20brother%20revisited%20Event%20final.pdf