I find this argument unfair. I joined Semantic Web research in 2004 and the only widespread use of RDF seemed RSS and annotating pages for parental control. We were all looking very hard for use cases where we could use the linked data, that would stick. Schema.org lead to a major use case and the creation of trillions of triples in millions of sites. But schema.org doesn't take away from other opportunities to use data. It's just I still think that the potential here is widely underused.

That seems an unfair and mean comment. First, it is PMs, not developers, who decide on such features. Second, there are much more fun features than just ordering food and listing birthdays.

Whereas it is true that the enclosure of the Web began at that time, I wouldn't put it on the Web 2.0. Web 2.0 was all about small wikis, personal blogs, and Yahoo pipes connecting many different APIs across the web.

Doesn't seem defunct. The site seems still up.