ShiftSpace is an open-source metaweb or web annotation

Web annotation

A web annotation is an online annotation associated with a web resource, typically a web page. With a Web annotation system, a user can add, modify or remove information from a Web resource without modifying the resource itself...

 application and framework that allows altering web pages with different tools. The tagline of the application is "an open source layer above any web page". It is implemented as a userscript for the Greasemonkey

Greasemonkey

Greasemonkey is a Mozilla Firefox extension that allows users to install scripts that make on-the-fly changes to HTML web page content on the DOMContentLoaded event, which happens immediately after it is loaded in the browser .As Greasemonkey scripts are persistent, the changes made to the web...

 extension for Firefox.

Usage

A ShiftSpace user viewing any webpage that has at least one Shift on it will notice the small ShiftSpace notifier icon on the bottom left corner of the browser window. By pressing the shift + space keys, a user invokes the "meta layer" for that particular page, and the additional user-created content becomes visible.

ShiftSpace user can invoke the "meta layer" above any web page to browse and create additional interpretations, contextualizations and interventions (called "Shifts"). The available tools for authoring shifts (called "Spaces") that are currently included in the core release are Notes, Highlights, ImageSwap, and SourceShift. Some Spaces are utilitarian (like Notes and Highlights) and some are more interventionist (like ImageSwap and SourceShift).

History

ShiftSpace was founded in 2006 by Dan Phiffer and Mushon Zer-Aviv, then students at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program

Tisch School of the Arts

Tisch School of the Arts is one of the 15 schools that make up New York University ....

. Later that year, it received a PrixArs honorary mention in the The Next Idea category from the Ars Electronica

Ars Electronica

Ars Electronica is an organization based in Linz, Austria, founded in 1979 around a festival for art, technology and society that was part of the International Bruckner Festival. Herbert W. Franke is one of its founders. It became its own festival and a yearly event in 1986. Its director until 1995...

 Center.

ShiftSpace has been covered by TechCrunch

TechCrunch

TechCrunch is a web publication that offers technology news and analysis, as well as profiling of startup companies, products, and websites. It was founded by Michael Arrington in 2005, and was first published on June 11, 2005....

 and CNet.

ShiftSpace is supported through a grant by the Swiss Confederation and by a commission through Rhizome.org

Rhizome (art)

Rhizome is a not-for-profit arts organization, that supports and provides a platform for new media art.-History:Artist and curator Mark Tribe founded Rhizome as a small email list in 1996 while living in Berlin. By August, Rhizome had launched its website, which by 1998 had developed a significant...

.

See also

• Wiki
  Wiki
  A wiki is a website that allows the creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor. Wikis are typically powered by wiki software and are often used collaboratively by multiple users. Examples include...
  
  s, websites which allow users (either certain users or all users) to edit them via a web interface
• Reframe It
  Reframe It
  Reframe It is a free social networking and website annotation/commenting tool thatrequires the download of a free browser extension or the addition of a bookmarklet . This recommended Mozilla add-on is a virtual margin at the right of any internet page that users can open or close to make comments...
  
  , a free plug-in that allows users to comment anywhere on the web without the permission of the website