Overlay Web

Refers to the ability to annotate the web, independent from the original author's intentions.

Definition

From http://www.communitywiki.org/en/WebAnnotation#OverlayWeb

The OverlayWeb makes the entire world wide web editable.

The OverlayWeb is a second web that twins the world wide web. When surfing the OverlayWeb, you aren’t limited to the original author’s version of any webpage. The owner’s version of the webpage is just one branch in the revision history tree for the page. You, the person browsing the page, decide which branch or branches to focus your attention on.

Examples

There are many OverlayWebs in existance right now, and likely to be many more in the future.

• WikalongExtension – a wiki-based OverlayWeb

URL = http://wikalong.phunnel.org/wiki/

• AnnoteaProject – a W3C led annotation system

URL = http://www.w3.org/2001/Annotea/