Ok, now jump forward to 1998, I'm now out of College and the Creative Arts Pastor at a church in the Chicago area. I had just returned back to the office from the Fed-Ex drop box, At that time I was hiring an arranger on a weekly basis to create charts for me, but he lived on the other side of the Chicago area. It's a big city you know, so I would make a cassette of the songs needed, then fed-ex him the cassette, so he could arrange the songs and then either fed-ex or fax me back the needed charts. Usually a week long process. As I got back to the office I was met by the former Creative Arts Pastor, back in town visiting friends, and we began talking music, ministry and the latest advances. My good friend Kirk then began to tell me about this brand new thing called an "MP3." He told me how it could take a huge CD song file and condense it down to a tiny file that you could even possibly email. (You could just see the little light bulb go off over my head right about then.) It was a short time later I put my idea into action..I could rip the songs I needed for our services, email then to an arranger, then as long as I had the same notation software, they could then email me the charts I needed and then all I had to do was print. It was a lot quicker and definately cheaper. Fed-Ex was costing me 17 bucks each week to deliver cassettes.
So why do I share this, other than it being kind of humorous, just think of the advances we've seen in the past 10 years when it comes to the internet. The .PDF, .MP3's, iTunes, their annoying counterpart the .MP4's, Google, instant chat, buddy lists...and the list goes on. What an exciting age we live in as Ministers in the local church. Never before have churches been able to communicate information and resources throughout the world with such ease. And now I believe we're on the doorstep of the next level of information sharing. Some have labled this next generation as "Web 2.0." So what is Web 2.0? Just like software releases, that are released as version 1.0 then 2.0 then 3.0, all that has taken place on the internet in the past 10 years, mostly static html pages, have been classified as Web 1.0. So what is Web 2.0 all about, one definition is that it refers to "a perceived or proposed second generation of Internet-based services—such as social networking sites, wikis, communication tools, and folksonomies—that emphasize online collaboration and sharing among users." (This definition actually came from a Web 2.0 site, the wikipedia) In addition to using the latest programming code, such as AJAX, that can create a site that responds similar to downloaded software, but eliminating the need to download anything making it fully accessible simply through your internet connection and web browser.
MinistryHub.com is considered a Web 2.0 site. As more and more users begin to use it, through the gathering of information, it's value to you will continue to grow as time goes by. For your techies, it's being programmed using AJAX and structured around the "Ruby On Rails" platform. If those are new terms to you, basically it means it's going to be easy and fun to use. To get an ideas of some other Web 2.0 sites out there make a point to check out www.ebible .com and www.mychurch.org .
I'm excited about the next 10 years and how the internet is going to impact ministry of the future!
Tim Yates
President, MinistryHub.com
