What's a widget?

I've seen the term "Web 2.0" several times and not wanting to look or sound ignorant, decided to look around the web for what it is.
Wikipedia says " Web 2.0" refers to what is perceived as a second generation of web development and web design. It is characterized as facilitating communication, information sharing, interoperability, User-centered design[1] and collaboration on the World Wide Web. It has led to the development and evolution of web-based communities, hosted services, and web applications. Examples include social-networking sites, video-sharing sites, wikis, blogs, mashups and folksonomies." (Wikipedia, 2009)
So I guess this (my blog) is Web 2.0 stuff.
I found an interesting article about Web 2.0 and some New York libraries using grant money to help students access reference materials through the public libraries.
They will use widgets which is a small mechanical device to send the students doing homework and assignments to the correct places in the reference databases.
Teachers and librarians will have training on this in November. They hope to have the first one going by Dec. 1, 2009. Check out the article.
http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6666827.html?industryid=47079