Web 2.0 and Your Business

>> Web 2.0. I am not sure...

>> 2.0 sounds like some kind of disestate phonetic like you know, like you have CNN2 and CNN whatever.

>> It sounds like a website but I've never been to it.

>> Sounds like a radio station.

>> The term Web 2.0 is the buzz phrase of the internet these days. But do most people really know what it is?

>> No idea.

>> Some new computer program maybe?

>> I've heard of it but I'm not that familiar with it.

>> Ah, its kind of the next generation of Internet...

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>> Web 2.0 is basically a series of technologies that represents the maturing of the web as a platform.

>> The internet is now a flurry of social networking. Bloggin. RSS feeds. And Wikis. But does any of this mean anything to your business?

ZT Net editor and chief, Dan Farber, helps clarify this new tech revolution, and lets us know how it can best be put to use within your organization.

>> Farber: All these technologies add up to being about participation. About collaboration and making those connections and I think its very important that companies understand that there's a huge value to be gained from applying these technologies within an enterprise.

>> We're beginning to use it.

>> We talk about it but we haven't implemented it, per se.

>> Web 2.0 makes business collaboration easier than ever.

>> Farber: We see many companies who are blogging quite a bit and allowing their employees to blog and this is a way to get employees involved more deeply in the company because they're expressing their opinions, their ideas and hopefully some of that will get to the top of the company and perhaps be a new idea that could get implemented.

It also makes the employees feel like they're really part of more of a democratic society as opposed to an hierarchical organization with a command in control infrastructure...

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>> Farber: Wikis is another technology that is become very popular as a low cost but very efficient way to collaborate. So for example before companies had to buy very expensive software, and to take a lot of time to set it up... well Wiki you can set up in minutes and get people working, collaborating on it obviously very quickly. And collaboration tends to be one of the most difficult areas right now. Because if people dispersed in companies, people working in different countries and so finding these tools and using the internet as a platform is one of the best ways to overcome those problems.

>> Web 2.0 isn't only a series of new web collaboration tools, its also the next generation for many existing applications.

>> Farber: It used to be that all the applications were primarily desktop based or so called client server and now we're seeing many applications becoming browser based. Focused on being able to run on the web, as well as to have an offline components. So for example we're seeing suites comparable to Microsoft Office that will run on the web. And we're also seeing very importantly new development modalities. One of those being mash ups. So for example lets say a real-estate company and you want to identify on a may where certain houses are or buildings that you're selling or that are on the market, you can certainly mash up with any of the maps out there and the web searches such as google or yahoo, very easily. In addition it's a new development environment in the sense that there are many more things you can do with this mash up kind of technologies. Such as taking your own internal corporate information, putting it into a widget and then being able to serve it up in your portal in a kind of dashboard framework. Or even to bring it over to your personal page so that you will always have it with you no matter where you. And what that has the impact of doing, is keeping your employees the management aware of what's going on within the company in a much more fluid way.

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>> Online collaboration tools don't come without the worry of online security risks. There also have to be rules of conduct.

>> Farber: For any company that's applying Web 2.0 technologies, there's some critical paths to follow. And one of those is making sure that it fits in with the core infrastructure that a company has regarding security and compliance and a code of conduct. Because when you give the keys to the kingdom to the employees, or to your partners, or even to your customers in terms of this feedback loop and allowing this participatory environment, you need to have some controls in place.

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>> So what does this ultimately mean to your enterprise?

>> Farber: Now if you add these technologies individually, you know, some will have appropriate uses in one company and maybe not in another. Some companies will want blogging, some won't. Some will want wikis; some will say no social networking. But at the bottom of all this, in Web 2.0, is this notion of harnessing collective intelligence. Which is to say, we have this massive of smart people within a company, all working toward this goals within the company and why not figure out ways in which they can tap into that collective intelligence.

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>> For more information go to bnet.com

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