Collaborative Thinking

A Lasting Legacy

Very sad news – but what a lasting legacy not only for his family but for the rest of us who were moved by the video and his life story.

'Last Lecture' professor, Randy Pausch, dies at 47 - USATODAY.com

Randy Pausch, the Carnegie Mellon professor who became a YouTube phenomenon with his "Last Lecture," died Friday of complications from pancreatic cancer. He was 47. He died at his home in southern Virginia.

RELATED: Professor Pausch's life, 'Lecture' go from Web to book

VIDEO: See 'Last Lecture' on YouTube

PHOTOS: Randy Paush's life in pictures

AUDIO: Hear a clip from 'Lecture'

'Last Lecture' professor, Randy Pausch, dies at 47 - USATODAY.com

Updated: Community and Social network Vendor Blogs

In an earlier post, "Community and Social Network Vendor Blogs", I provided a list of vendors that had public-facing blogs. I missed the Lithium blog (my bad). The folks at HiveLive have recently launched a blog and I forgot to include Ringside Networks. I added iCohere to the list of vendors that do not have a public-facing blog but based on a comment in the original post, it sounds like that situation might be resolved this year. So - the list has been updated (I updated the original post here).

Let the man play...

I’ve been a Packer fan since I was 8 years old (circa 1966). I’ve been through the glory years and the “let me hide and suffer in misery” years. As much as it the current situation might be be difficult or uncomfortable due to poor communication, lack of understanding and (gasp) ego – Brett can still play the game, and play it at a level better than most QBs in the game.

Let the man play…   

FOX Sports on MSN - Jason Whitlock - Hey Ted, I'm here to help

Hi, my name is Jason Whitlock. I'm sure you've heard of me. My reputation in football circles is well established.

I'm the guy who told Bill Belichick to stick with Tom Brady over Drew Bledsoe years ago. When Bill Polian was debating Peyton Manning vs. Ryan Leaf, I was the voice on the phone at 2 a.m. the morning of the draft assuring Polian that Manning was the right choice. I told Parcells to take a long look at an undrafted quarterback from Eastern Illinois.

I know quarterbacks, how they think, what motivates them and whether they're any good.

You're in a jam in Green Bay with Brett Favre. You need me. You need my guidance, my expertise. If you're not careful, you're going to continue to mismanage this situation and go down in history as the dumbest general manager in the history of professional sports.

FOX Sports on MSN - Jason Whitlock - Hey Ted, I'm here to help

I know it's Friday, but can I have an online community by Monday?

Interesting analysis and data coming out from a study (see below). My initial thought though however is: why is this a surprise? For those that covered this space in the late nineties (Dot Com 1.0) we went through a very similar experience. There was a very high degree of irrational exuberance by companies wanting to launch online communities. Most failed. Now we’re back using terms like social media and social networks. One can make the case that the technology can enable a better user and group experience but the fundamentals of relationship and community-building are not advanced by better tooling. This is very hard work. I would recommend you sign up for the BeeLine Labs report (last citation link below).    

Business Technology : Why Most Online Communities Fail

One of the hot investments for businesses these days is online communities that help customers feel connected to a brand. But most of these efforts produce fancy Web sites that few people ever visit. The problem: Businesses are focusing on the value an online community can provide to themselves, not the community.

Most corporate-sponsored online communities are virtual ghost towns

That’s according to Ed Moran, a Deloitte consultant who just completed a study of more than 100 businesses with online communities. Not surprisingly, these sites failed to gain traction with customers. Thirty-five percent of the online communities studied have less than 100 members; less than 25% have more than 1,000 members – despite the fact that close to 60% of these businesses have spent over $1 million on their community projects. “A disturbingly high number of these sites fail,” Moran tells us.

Business Technology : Why Most Online Communities Fail

SitePoint Blogs » Study: Why Most Online Communities Fail

• Businesses are being enticed by fancy technology. Mesmerized by bells and whistles, many business are foolishly blowing their entire budgets on technology. Moran’s advice is to reach out to community members and let them do your R&D for you, rather than blowing it on fancy tech you may not really need. If the goal of a community associated with a brand is to get people to evangelize your products or services, put money and time into reaching out them rather than developing a fancy site.
• Lack of proper management. The Deloitte study found that 30% of online communities have just part-time employees in charge, and most have just a single PR person running the show. Advice: hire a social community manager with experience running and building an online community. Managed communities are a lot less likely to grow organically the way general mainstream social networks do, so you need someone who knows how to build one in charge. My former colleague Marshall Kirkpatrick wrote a great post earlier this week about the merits of online community managers.
• The wrong measurement metrics. Moran noticed that most businesses are measuring the success of their communities in the wrong way. Though their stated goals are usually to create viral, word-of-mouth marketing and increase brand loyalty, the metric they use to gauge success is unique visitors. If all you’re after is growing visits to the site, then you’re missing the point. You’re not trying to compete with mainstream social networks, so you don’t need to chase eyeballs. Rather you need to build interaction and create a level of comfort among your most loyal users so they will evangelize your products for you. The best way to measure this might be by looking at things like blog mentions and Twitter tweets.

SitePoint Blogs » Study: Why Most Online Communities Fail

Beeline Labs » The 2008 Tribalization of Business study

THE MAJOR TAKEAWAYS

#1: Communities are about Delivering Game-Changing Results

• Communities can increase revenue per customer dramatically, i.e., 50%
• Communities will increase product introduction success ratios
• Communities amplify everything you do- increasing effectiveness and decreasing costs

#2: The Rise of the CMO 2.0?

• Communities should be an important part of the CMO’s toolset (but for many large companies - there is an under-investment and scale problem)
• Companies should evolve the role of the CMO into Chief Community Officer (but that will require drastic changes in attitude and approach to marketing)
• If done properly, communities will transform the way marketing works (reduced costs, improved effectiveness, new opportunities)

#3: The Need for New Management Thinking

• Mismatch between community goals and associated investments
• Major gaps between Community Goals and what is being measured
• Communities have yet to combine with major talent initiatives
• Communities will transform most business processes

#3.5: The Worst Practices Enjoy Wide Adoption

• The “build it and they will come” fallacy
• The “let’s keep it small so it doesn’t move the needle” phenomenon
• The “not invented here” syndrome

Beeline Labs » The 2008 Tribalization of Business study

Leveraging Employee Social Networks

These are the slides I will reference tomorrow for a webinar on social networks offered by the Human Capital Institute. There is still time to register if you are interested in the topic.

| View | Upload your own

IM Standards: Vendor's Are In A Different Reality

How many years have we been talking about interoperability standards for IM and presence? Why has the SIP/SIMPLE specification evolved so slowly? Why are vendors implementing their own versions of “rich presence” vs. working through the standards process (SIMPLE specifically)? Why do vendors find it so difficult to aggregate and federate presence in a fair and bi-directional manner without trying to gain an advantage by not sharing its extensions (Microsoft appears especially guilty here)? Why does Sametime cling to its proprietary protocol internally? Why does Microsoft not support XMPP in its gateway? Why do most communication vendors (e.g., Cisco) find XMPP so radioactive?

I think the Avaya/Jabber partnership should be specifically called out. Avaya really should be congratulated on its effort to shear off presence into its own server and aggregate both SIP/SIMPLE and XMPP. That is such a breadth of fresh air…

Seriously … the situation is an embarrassment to the industry. I wish vendors would stop whining or try to explain it away and “just do it”.

Michael Osterman posted an interesting piece today on Network World, "Standardizing instant messaging protocols". Basically, he makes the point that technology adoption increases rapidly after an industry settles on a single standard. And he wonders if the fact that we have two standards for IM interoperability, SIP and XMPP, has held back the overall market.
It's an interesting thought. And just to fact check the article, Sametime supports both XMPP and SIP in our Public IM Gateway. (Mike only included us in the SIP camp.)

The Sametime Blog

Next Document: Reference Architecture For Social Network Sites

What are the architectural components of a social network site?

Implementing an internal “corporate Facebook” web site has become a frequent request to IT organizations from employees, line-of-business managers, human resource groups, and C-level executive teams. However, there are few commonly accepted practices regarding what architectural components need to be included in such a web site to qualify it as an internal version of the popular consumer site, Facebook. This reference architecture template begins with a set of baseline requirements established by danah boyd and Nicole B. Ellison. The authors’ analysis identifies key repeating characteristics found across consumer social network sites. Their analysis helps establish a common baseline for architects to understand what attributes need to be included in a social network site. Burton Group recognizes these attributes as inherent traits social network sites deployed within the enterprise should minimally provide to its employees (“actors” in social network terms):

• A visible profile within a bounded system which describes the actor
• A public or semi-public display of connections between that actor and their relations (e.g., “friends”)
• An ability for people to traverse those connections (e.g., to view profiles associated with the list of “friends”)

Although boyd’s and Ellison’s research does not explicitly identify the following attributes as core functions, Burton Group believes that such capabilities should also be included within a social network site definition:

• A means for other members to particiapte, interact and contact the actor (e.g., e-mail, instant messaging, chat rooms, blogs, and message boards)
• A set of controls for that actor to manage his/her own visibility (search, profile viewing)
• A set of controls for that actor to manage how they prefer to interact or be contacted by other entities (e.g., messages)

Mapping these attributes into the architectural components listed below can assist enterprise architects, infrastructure planners, application developers and other audiences to design a social network site:

• Profiles
• Social Graph
• Participation Models
• Social Presence
• Relation Controls

Template Diagram:

Quick Summary Of Client Meetings At Catalyst

Just a quick summary of my client meetings during our Catalyst event. Due to my speaking schedule and my role as a track moderator, I was available on one of the three days for onsite discussions. But, what a day ... 14 meetings, 30 minutes each - so 7 hours. Here's the quick overview of my impressions:

• Every meeting involved a Microsoft product
• 2 of the sessions involved OCS
• 12 of the sessions involved SharePoint (re: social computing)
• Of those 12
  • 2 were “happy” (happy as defined by either (a) the capabilities matched the awareness of such tools by their end-users and/or (b) a belief that the social software tools would improve in the next release and that the platform approach was best in the long run
  • 10 were not-so-happy (with the social computing aspects of SharePoint, not with SharePoint overall)
• 10 had seemingly reached a point where they felt they should look beyond what SharePoint offers out-of-the-box, via Codeplex and  through customization - and explore where partner solutions can augment current capabilities, fill in gaps, or replace weak capabilities (e.g., SharePoints wiki which one person agreed with the metaphor “it’s not really a wiki, it’s more like a rich page editor”).
• Many of those 10 were most open to NewsGator, Telligent, and Atlassian. 
• Jive was viewed as the most credible “mini suite vendor” with a viable alternative for shops that wanted a cleaner and more explicit separation from SharePoint. The reasoning was based on a pro/con of managing and coordinating multiple vendors that extended SharePoint and the longevity of the integration model as the next version of SharePoint matures to some extent. Jive, although more architecturally opposed to SharePoint (e.g., Java, etc) seems attractive because of an all-in-one platform, compelling user experience and perception that it is more modern re: Web 2.0 / Enterprise 2.0. (Note: That said, Jive still is missing certain functional areas such as feed syndication so vendors like Attensa and NewsGator are still needed.)
• IBM Lotus Connections came up in a few of the conversations but unless the client already had WebSphere Portal or Notes/Domino, there seems to be some hesitancy to rekindle past wars over e-mail and collaboration – not really a Connections critique at all, but more of an IBM/Lotus vs. Microsoft debate. 
• Most of those 10 also seemed to be in various stages of disappointment with (1) the functionality of its social software (2) the long lapses between releases and (3) uncertainty that things will get dramatically better in the next version (Note: Those familiar with Microsoft’s internal effort called “TownSquare” were more optimistic and would like that solution now – although it is unclear whether that solution will be in the next release).
• Only one session did a client actually seem intrigued with Codeplex and that was only after I explained the best way to look at it (e.g., not as a Microsoft product but as something that is better than building it internally since virtually all shops customize SharePoint anyways). If you set expectations correctly, it can be a decent option. (Note: Microsoft should really support these extensions – or they need to go back to feature/function upgrades via service packs - people are getting very grumpy over the three year release cycle that, when it does come out, delivers functionality that is behind where the bar has now been set). 
• The two OCS meetings were much more positive – one client seemed to be at a 12K deployment level (the largest I have found “in the wild”) although there are concerns often regarding interoperability with PBX vendors (especially when it comes to rich presence) and the overall maturity of the platform.

That's it ... back to writing my reference architecture template on social network sites.

Twitter & XMPP Scale

Hmm … I’ve read the original Twitter blog post but I cannot find a strong direct statement that points the finger at XMPP not scaling … perhaps the Jabber folks or someone can clarify this entry (or perhaps the point is simply being stretched a bit to make the case for Gnip). Is it the Twitter design or a wall that XMPP hits for this type of social application. My inclination so far was to think that XMPP itself was not the problem, that it had to do with the design, topology and infrastructure related to Twitter. But the folks at Gnip seem to imply that XMPP might be an issue when used in this manner at least – thoughts?

Let’s address the first issue: How we would benefit Twitter and anyone that wants to integrate with Twitter data.

Twitter has found that XMPP doesn’t scale for them and as a result, people are forced to poll their API *a lot* to get updates for their users.  MyBlogLog has over 25,000 Twitter users that they throw against the Twitter API every 15 minutes.  This results in nearly 2.5 million queries against the API every day, for maybe 250K updates.  Now add millions of pings from Plaxo and SocialThing and Lijit and heaven forbid Yahoo starts beating up their API…

If Twitter starts pushing updates to us, via our dead simple API or Atom or their XMPP server, we can immediately reduce by an order of magnitude the number of requests that some very large sites are making against their API.  At the same time, we reduce the latency between when someone Tweets and when it shows up on consuming sites like Plaxo.  From 15 minutes or more to 60 seconds or less.

Gnip: We got $h*t to pop » That Twitter thing

Social Networking Webinar

FYI: I’m an “expert advisor” for the corporate social networking community and will be presenting on the following topic:

Title: Connectivity Powers Talent: Leveraging Employee Social Networks

When: Fri, Jul 18 2008 / 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM ET

According to a recent survey, 83% of workers rate relationships with co-workers as a critical reason for joining and staying with their employer, and alternatively, one in four people quit a job due to feelings of isolation. Organizations that provide talent with tools to connect, build and manage their personal and professional networks, bond people to each other and to the organization. Moreover, organizations that offer employee social networking have an edge in attracting talent who thrives on these tools to exchange knowledge and ideas.

During this webcast, you'll hear from leading Burton Group analyst Mike Gotta on how to:

Tap the power of online social networks to better engage your workforce

Implement the tools to facilitate improved knowledge sharing across globally dispersed organizations

Leverage employee social networks to increase job satisfaction, retention and innovation

Create corporate social networks and communities for expertise location and knowledge sharing

Build the business case for corporate social networking within your own organization.

The Human Capital Institute - Corporate Social Networking Learning Track

More Oracle E2.0 Insights

The four blog postings below provide additional context and background to the recent webcast on the Oracle and BEA E2.0 strategy moving forward that I posted about earlier. What I find interesting (and mildly confusing) is that the face-to-face conversation that the bloggers/analysts below had with Charles Phillips actually reveal more “completeness of thought” in terms of E2.0 than what was delivered during the recent webcast. Concepts related to emergence for instance are better articulated as are thoughts related to communities and social networks.

There remains however some noticeable gaps in terms of Oracle’s understanding of Enterprise 2.0. Overall, Oracle’s message within these posts keeps falling back to a basic position that equates E2.0 as a framework that covers all forms of collaboration. It also tends to view E2.0 primarily through the lens of applications and processes. Such positions are “ok” but inhibits Oracle from being perceived as a solution provider capable of addressing the organizational dynamics related to communities and social networking. 

Additionally, the sales force chartered to push Oracle’s message of E2.0 appears to be a program designed to leverage cross-functional / cross-product synergies without the expertise needed to pitch solutions anchored by social applications, communities and social networking (reinforcing my point above that it’s mostly about the applications and WebCenter). Since communities and social networks are likely to be a core part of anyone’s planning effort related to E2.0, it leaves one wondering if Oracle is thinking beyond structured processes and supporting middleware. Just rolling out tools is not really the point – to catalyze some of the social dynamics Charles outlines below – you need more than technologists selling infrastructure.

More to come I’m sure, the journey to map out Oracle’s E2.0 strategy continues…

IIan Yip's Security and Identity Thought Stream: Roundtable with Oracle President Charles Phillips

In trying to help us understand how Oracle views Enterprise 2.0, Charles gave the following examples:

• Finding the right expert internally within an organisation to help with something you are doing - Charles talked about how Oracle encourages their employees to tag themselves as being "experts" in certain areas. In addition to this, others get to vote on whether you are really an expert in the areas you claim. It's the whole notion of reputation...very Identity 2.0. …..
• ….. Oracle wants to move this informal information sharing into the CRM system to facilitate more collaborative interaction between the sales teams and help identify useful material using things such as tagging and voting so they can more easily find materials and not have to re-invent the wheel. Doing this also gives management more visibility with regards to what is working, what is useful and how to potentially improve things.

Ian Yip's Security and Identity Thought Stream: Roundtable with Oracle President Charles Phillips

Oracle readies dedicated 2.0 sales force — Too much information

Duplicated across Oracle’s regions and reporting to the regional head, the Enterprise 2.0 sales team lead with the WebCenter platform for composite applications, as well as more traditional software products such as Oracle Portal and what was formerly Stellent content management software. Oracle’s Beehive next-generation collaboration platform will also be in the mix, although Charles was less forthcoming about the details of the new enterprise collaboration product.

What he did say is that the Enterprise 2.0 sales force will be made up of both BEA and Oracle sales and consulting experts and will make use of the Oracle Insight Program consulting service to analyze customers’ business processes to identify opportunities for the deployment of internal and external collaborative applications \.

The sales force will engage with both business and IT managers and will have an eye on enabling enterprise-wide strategic adoption of collaborative software, although most of the obvious opportunities are likely to be departmental or focused on specific applications - such as CRM and SCM.

Oracle readies dedicated 2.0 sales force — Too much information

Macehiter Ward-Dutton: Blog on IT-business alignment and related things

• Oracle is relaunching its collaboration offering. The new Oracle Beehive technology is being developed to sit alongside Oracle's existing technology stack as outlined above, and it's not escaped Oracle's attention that if it can make market inroads with an Enterprise 2.0 story, it has a potential follow-on opportunity to displace some of the (very large chunk of) enterprise spending that goes on "heritage" collaboration software product upgrades. The company's Collaboration Suite hardly set the world on fire back in 2002-05: this shows that Oracle is revving up to have another go. But avoiding taking the incumbents on head-on this time.
• As well as building out a standalone proposition, Oracle is folding the technology into its other offerings and processes. Phillips talked about work going on to integrate the collaboration platform capabilities in Beehive together with its Fusion applications and its BPM technology offering. But it's also taking much of the technology and using that internally within Oracle - and as it learns about what works, it's infusing a number of its own business processes with an Enterprise 2.0 flavour.

Macehiter Ward-Dutton: Blog on IT-business alignment and related things

Oracle president Charles Phillips: Evangelising Enterprise 2.0

So what's the pitch that CEOs need to be hearing about Enterprise 2.0? According to Philips, its one about communication and being open to hearing ideas from all parts of the organisation. “What I tell CEOs is 'Do you think that there are good ideas at the lower echelons of the business that you want to know about?' If not, then they shouldn't be doing Enteprise 2.0. But really you should never be afraid of more information. Enterprise 2.0 is self-organising, so good ideas tend to bubble to the top, but bad ideas don't get much currency. Ideas get embedded through peer pressure. Now, either you believe the wisdom of the crowd is useful or you don't. Most of the CEOs I talk to get it, but it can be uncomfortable according to what your organisation is like.

A two way 'conversation' is essential. “It's vital for us to get customer feedback constantly,” noted Phillips.

…

The organisations that get this message most easily are often those who also recognise the huge opportunity that interaction with their customers represents. “It's the concept of the long tail,” explained Phillips. “There is great technology in Enterprise 2.0 to reach out to micro-markets. You can get to small, focused groups that are interested in certain subjects. Netflix is good example in that it started out with all the mainstream titles but ran into competition with Blockbusters so they started to do the more genre, more niche titles. That's now 70% of its business. That's good to be able to find new pockets of demand. It's also something dangerous for any business to ignore.

…

People now tag themselves in collaborative environments according to what their expertise is. We all need to find people who are experts so they tag themselves.

…

With Enteprise 2.0, you can bring everyone into the same community and make them feel closer to the core.

Oracle president Charles Phillips: Evangelising Enterprise 2.0 - 13 May 2008

Blogging Mandatory Or Voluntary?

Or perhaps rephrase the question: When should blogging be mandatory and when should it be voluntary?

Some organizations might integrate blogs within formal work practices and business processes so there may be situations when in fact, blogging is required. For instance, perhaps a company decides that competitive intelligence analysts should blog their personal insights about what they are seeing in the market (yes, it could be a wiki as well). Or suppose Utilization Management nurses are provided with a blog application as the preferred method of capturing notes while they interact with various health network providers. The examples may not be perfect but the point is that limiting blogs only to voluntary situations can limit their benefits. If you want to address the knowledge management aspects that people cite then I totally agree that conscripting people to blog is a bad idea. Some blogs and/or blog entries are best when informal and voluntarily created/posted. On the other hand, I can see situations that are more structured and integrated with project management situations, or certain process-related activities, where mandating blogs could work quite well.

When I discuss blogs and blogging with clients, I try to get across the notion of different types and categories of blogging patterns. Some might be more community-centric while others might be more formal and structured. There are certain situations when an informal solutions works best – and other situations where a more structured solution works well – especially as blogs evolve to expose its content in more granular and structured ways (e.g., microformants, Atom/AtomPub) that allow systems to extract needed data.

So don’t make blogging compulsory (especially if driven by the KM angle) unless it needs to be (when driven by the process angle).

At my panel on What Blogging Brings To Business at the Enterprise 2.0 Conference, there was some discussion about whether a company should make blogging mandatory. I sense the audience and the panel thought it was a bad idea.

Mary Abraham of Above and Beyond KM calls it Knowledge Management Made Easier and points to a story by Tim Leberecht:  The Writing Organization: Knowledge Management Made Easy. Mary seems to think mandatory blogging would be a good idea.

Dave Snowden points to a blog post from Stephen Holt [Mandatory employee blogs: one way to boost knowledge] which seeks to make blogging mandatory as a means of making tacit knowledge explicit. Dave's reaction:

"Aside from the perpetuation of the myth of tacit-explicit knowledge conversion (more on this tomorrow), the idea of compulsion flies in the face of all theory and practice in social computing.  Its a classic; find something which is working, then ruin it by compulsion."

KM Space: Make Blogging Mandatory for Knowledge Management

Community and Social Network Vendor Blogs

I find it interesting that some of the smaller vendors playing in the community and social networking market are missing public-facing blogs. I was updating my feed subscriptions this and remain surprised that certain vendors still don’t seem to have implemented what I consider a basic stake in the game. If any of these vendors has a blog that I’ve missed, please let me know and I’ll correct my list below.

Otherwise, my advice is “ante up”…

Vendors Missing A Public Blog

• Communispace
• iCohere
• Ramius (Note: there is a blog for Sixent which is in beta)
• SelectMinds
• Sparta Social Networks
• Tomoye

Vendors That Have Public Blog(s):

• Awareness
• HiveLive
• Jive Software
• Leverage Software
• Lithium
• Mzinga
• Ringside Networks
• Small World Labs
• Telligent

One request to those vendors that do have blogs: please use full items in your feeds. Summaries that force readers back to the destination site are not a best practice (in general) in my book.

For Social Networks To Go Big, They Need To Go Small

The article below provides a good overview of one way to look at distributed social networks. I have become a fan of microformats (e.g., hCard, XFN – some deeper insight here) and how they create “social network fragments” that other systems (perhaps using Google’s Social Graph API) can leverage by aggregating such fragments into a representation of someone’s social network or even a stream of a their activities (example here). There are also interesting synergies between XFN and identity (for more, check out this article Identity consolidation with the XFN rel="me" value) and and between XFN and FOAF.

After you think about some of the concepts outlined in the article, ask your “favorite enterprise vendor” where they stand on some of the following technology trends: microformats (especially hCard and XFN), FOAF, Apache Shindig (which leverages OpenSocial), Project SocialSite (sponsored by Sun) and related initiatives such as Google’s Social Graph API. Try not to be too disappointed by their replies - many vendors struggle to look beyond their own marketing efforts and product roadmaps.

In any case - the article below remains a good read...

The New Social Networking

The Distributed Social Network—or DSN—is the idea of bringing together disparate user information easily and interoperably between social services. It’s often used synonymously with ‘Portable Social Network’, which is a term more focused on moving data between services.

The motivation of DSN is not about being able to ‘dump’ social networks for others. This isn’t about being able to effortlessly quit Facebook and join Bebo. The motivation is to let people use different services with less effort—being able to get set and running with Dopplr and Flickr without having to find friends and contacts by hand every time.

This technology is about surfacing information which is already published. User names, profiles, and contact lists are already out there, buried in HTML. No user is being asked to expose themselves any more than they are; what we’re doing is to make that public information consumable in a consistent manner, to create a better user experience across sites.

Digital Web Magazine - Portable Social Networks, The Building Blocks Of A Social Web

Be Careful What You Watch

Disappointing decision (this seems to be pretty clear re: privacy rights given previous rulings) - if this decision stands, organizations that leverage YouTube (or similar services) as part of their own social media efforts might want to consider the derivative implications that this ruling might have on their customers since their viewing habits might no longer be private:

Viewing Habits of YouTube Users | Electronic Frontier Foundation

Yesterday, in the Viacom v. Google litigation, the federal court for the Southern District of New York ordered Google to produce to Viacom (over Google's objections):

all data from the Logging database concerning each time a YouTube video has been viewed on the YouTube website or through embedding on a third-party website

The court’s order grants Viacom's request and erroneously ignores the protections of the federal Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA), and threatens to expose deeply private information about what videos are watched by YouTube users. The VPPA passed after a newspaper disclosed Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork's video rental records. As Congress recognized, your selection of videos to watch is deeply personal and deserves the strongest protection.

Court Ruling Will Expose Viewing Habits of YouTube Users | Electronic Frontier Foundation

Social Media Opportunities For Improving Disaster Response

I have not gone through this yet (add it to my list of things-to-do), but it might be worth scanning to see if community and related outreach efforts that might leverage social media are being considered to augment the core activities related to crisis management, etc.

On the Brink: Re-Engineering the Nation's Disaster Response Processes

Published:  July 1, 2008

Content:  27 essays by emergency-response experts representing corporations, local chambers of commerce, federal and local government, academe, and humanitarian-aid organization

Executive Summary

An increasing number of businesses and their partners are interested in redefining the goals of disaster management.

Building on experiences from Hurricane Katrina and other major disasters, BCLC and the companies involved in the Disaster Assistance and Recovery program are working toward a holistic approach to disaster response.

We want to enable communities to recover faster and rebuild better.

We want to enable communities to recover faster and rebuild better.

This issue is much larger than the business community. It is much larger than the voluntary sector and it is even larger than FEMA. It requires new attitudes and fresh thinking on the part of local, state, and federal government authorities.

As this publication will show, some organizations in every sector are taking steps to re-engineer the disaster response process.

Much still needs to be done. We have not yet reached a tipping point. Many systems are still rooted in older ways of doing things. We are making progress, but we still have a long way to go to improve our nation's capacity to effectively respond to disasters.

Business Civic Leadership Center - On the Brink - Re-engineering the Nation's Disaster Response Processes

Another Analyst Departure

Hmmm .... first Charlene and now Rachel - two well-known analysts leaving on the same day in the same coverage area ... ok - who's next? Bueller...Bueller...

In any case, best of luck to Rachel as well!

While at IDC I've gotten to meet more interesting people than I could mention here and see a huge array of technology and corporate innovation.  It has been a wonderful experience.

Alas, because of my operational experience, I am too antsy to remain on the sidelines as an analyst. I want to dig in a little more, work with companies to get their social media efforts off the ground successfully, and help develop hardened best practices and measurement guidelines.  As an analyst I can report on trends but I can't really understand the ins and outs what companies struggle with on a day to day basis.

The Social Organization: Leaving IDC...Joining Mzinga

She Set The Standard In This Space

Wow ... I wish Charlene the best in whatever she pursues next - at a pace that fits her priorities (work/life balance is a challenge in many professions, including ours). Like most others who follow the social computing/media space - I know we all look forward to her next adventure...

Why I'm leaving Forrester

Forrester has bent over backwards to be accommodating and flexible, but in the end, I have decided that I need to have greater control over how I allocate my time between work and family. As any working parent knows, there’s no such thing as balance – only a series of compromises on both the work and home front. For me and for now, that compromise needs to happen on the work front, so I have elected to leave Forrester on July 18th to have greater control over exactly when and how much time I devote to work and travel.  This was a difficult decision for me to make and I’ll be taking a few weeks off this summer to figure out my next step -- it is my goal to remain involved in this space, in a manner yet to be determined.

Why I'm leaving Forrester

Open Source Twitter?

It was only a matter of time... great idea!

Ross Mayfield's Weblog: Identi.ca Launches, an Open Source Twitter

Evan Prodromou, one of the better citizens of the wiki community and founder of WikiTravel, launched Identi.ca today.  Its a Twitter clone that is also distributed as Open Source licensed software.  I've been playing with it in semi-private beta. Its made Dave Winer's day and Jevon is Canadian. Marshall Kirkpatrick has a longer writeup and sees promise in federation:

Ross Mayfield's Weblog: Identi.ca Launches, an Open Source Twitter

Identi.ca: May A Million Twitters Bloom

Identi.ca is a new microblogging service that launched today - but it's not just another also-ran. The service is an Open Source, CreativeCommons framework for a distributed network of federated microblogging services.

If you've become interested in the paradigm changing model of communication popularized by Twitter but have been frustrated by Twitter's frequent down time or other shortcomings - then Identi.ca could be for you.

Built by Evan Prodromou, creator of the wonderful site WikiTravel, Identi.ca offers a number of features that Twitter users will find of interest. We learned about the launch on the CreativeCommons blog; Identi.ca supports CC licenses for all the content that flows through it.

Note that initial interest is already challenging the first implementation of this service, they are working on improving performance but it will work best once there are multiple interoperable installs!

Identi.ca: May A Million Twitters Bloom - ReadWriteWeb

Enterprise 2.0: Oracle & BEA Webcast

After the commentary, you will find a collection of links to different resources that provide additional information on Oracle's recent webcast regarding the BEA acquisition and Oracle's Enterprise 2.0 effort.

Webcast Notes

On Tuesday (7/1/08), Oracle provided an in-depth overview that provided insight regarding alignment, integration, and convergence of BEA and Oracle products into a common middleware solution. While I was mostly interested in the information provided on collaboration and social computing, I found some of the over-arching messages very important since that context established the lens through which you should judge what Oracle is offering to the market (e.g., Enterprise 2.0).

• First, I thought Thomas Kurian did an outstanding job of presenting the information in a manner that held my attention throughout the webcast. It was very detailed but not to the extent where you were lost overall.
• It was clear from the outset of the webcast that the notion of platform consistency is the foundation for everything Oracle is doing. In fact, "foundation" was perhaps a key sense conveyed throughout the session.
• Investment protection was another key take-away for those listening to the webcast. There was no rip-and-replace discussion.
• Unification and convergence were other words used frequently.
• Other key words that were repeated quite often: "complete", "pre-integrated", "standards-based", and "hot-pluggable". A paraphrased quote that might be revealing to keep in mind: "Install together, upgrade together, deploy together"
• Oracle views E2.0 as communication medium that is multi-channel - you can run composite UI on mobile, browser, PDA or other styles of devices - by composite UI Oracle sees a convergence of application styles:
  • when building rich media web site or building transactional application or building traditional portal or when building social computing site (portal with embedded communities) you had to pick different framework and tool set
  • key value proposition of Oracle is to leverage a single programming model to develop all four application styles (i.e., rich media style or traditional transactional application style or traditional enterprise portal style or a social computing style (e.g., communities)
  • Oracle's E2.0 plan is to unify the programming model for all of these patterns
• Oracle also views Enterprise 2.0 as a transformation in the way that people share information. Consider traditional scenarios: a business person runs a BI report (sales report), they want to share the report, today they use e-mail which leads to version problems, data inconsistency, search challenges etc. But Now, with Oracle's E2.0 foundation, that business person puts the document into the ECM system where it becomes secure, managed and searchable - they can make the report available within a workspace (that leverages the ECM system) and then RSS feeds can help get the information to subscribers. People can then interact around the document (chat, discussion forums, presence, VoIP) and when the interaction is complete, the document can be tagged/bookmarked where a tag cloud can help people find the information.
• For Oracle, the notion of "portal" is evolving (1) continued integration of web publishing, transactional applications and community and (2) evolving into integration of forums, wikis, blogs, rss, communities - portals are becoming a platform for richer communication
• Oracle is evolving its middleware to embrace E2.0 and "NextGen Portal" (think "Portal 2.0".
  • portals abstract all systems accessing through standard interface (implemented via JSR168, Web Service Remoting like WSRP or REST/HTTP)
  • portals have basic content management and search
  • portals provide the assembly and development environment 
  • portals expose data binding into all types of standard interfaces
• Everything goes though the portal layer.
• BEA AquaLogic User Interaction satisfied a more social style of portal where communities evolved. That will converge with WebCenter Suite. Customers will leverage WebCenter (e.g., content management, search, E2.0, integration with packaged applications, and BI). Pathways has a bright future. Oracle sees it as integral to user interaction with portal as it examines people's interaction patterns and will be able to personalize what people see based on how those interaction patterns are correlated to other activities  interaction and perhaps sets the ground for Oracle's network analysis of social patterns.
• Enterprise 2.0 slides:

Source: screen capture of Oracle webcast

First Reaction

Based on this webcast, I would categorize what Oracle is doing as "Portal 2.0" rather than "Enterprise 2.0". If you look back on some of the key points made during the webcast:

• An argument Oracle makes implicitly: what Oracle is doing represents a very robust, technically engineered middleware that is modular and standards-based as well as open - you can choose Oracle middleware alongside different products from other vendors ... Oracle and non-Oracle app servers, databases, etc.
• The argument continues but is more subtle on these points: This represents a single integrated toolset - you do not need to pick different tools and switch back-and-forth all the time - productivity win - yes we support multiple tools, multiple products, etc - but we don't think you need to do that - you are better off with a single, unified environment.
• So when you talk about E2.0 - it's about an Oracle stack and one that follows a portal and MVC (model view controller) interaction style. Note: in the block architectural diagram below, there is no Enterprise 2.0 component

Source: screen capture of Oracle webcast

Some of the examples cited during the webcast are more closely related to concepts put forth when the industry discussed the notion of "contextual collaboration" (circa 1999 through today - it is still a very relevant concept). The embedding of the collaborative services within the context of an application is not new. There are certain functional activities related to communication, information sharing and collaboration that can be correlated to the processing of certain tasks and process activities. That type of "directed" interaction is not really the foundation for E2.0 which is more about the use of social software for emergent collaboration.

What You Should Expect

Organizations can expect Oracle to push hard on the concept of a single interaction platform built for the enterprise that spans just not social computing but all the application patterns it sees (system, human, document, decision). Oracle will pitch convergence of

Content Management

• Document management, content publishing, collaborative content creation, content approval, security/audit/compliance, and information lifecycle management

Internet/Intranet Web Presence

• Website creation, portlet creation/orchestration, single sign-on, multi-channel delivery (mobile etc), secure search

Community/Social Collaboration

• Teams and individual expertise
• Project productivity
• Mashups
• Team collaboration
• Web 2.0 "stuff"
• Desktop integration

Composite Applications

• SOA processes
• Integrated development
• Component assembly/orchestration
• Process portals
• Custom and packaged enterprise applications
• Alerts

And roll all of this into an "Oracle Enterprise 2.0" umbrella.

Summary

Some key points came to mind immediately after viewing:

• Please do not confuse how Oracle defines the term Enterprise 2.0 with how the rest of the industry is using Enterprise 2.0. If you want to call this Portal 2.0  that might fit better.
• I think Oracle is close to getting it right but really needs to understand the free-form and emergence aspects of E2.0 - right now, this comes across as a solution that is not really aligned with the cultural dynamics around E2.0.
• There also needs to be a better job done at the ecosystem around the platform. Yes, this was about Oracle and BEA - but some of the messages here seemed to imply that "third party vendors need not apply" (or if you do so, do it at your own risk because we view you as tactical) - if you are a best-of-breed vendor specializing in the E2.0 space, I'm not sure I saw the long-term business model laid out during this webcast.
• I saw nothing to convince me this is relevant to the external social media efforts of large organizations. The social networking insight was also weak - although again, this was an Oracle/BEA alignment so I did not expect it to be addressed in that context. There were some hints re: Pathways.

Overall, the Oracle position revealed so far leads me to believe that this webcast reflects a message that is more about an Oracle brand and marketing program that leverages the Enterprise 2.0 meme than a deep understanding of the tooling and organizational dynamics associated with E2.0:

• It is a very centralized and portal-centric view - missing was much information on how Oracle's version of Enterprise 2.0 aligns with some of the information it has shared on its "Beehive" collaboration project. In fact, there was actually little insight as to how Oracle will resolve the overlap in its portfolio related to blogs and wikis, or where Oracle Collaboration Suite fits (or does not).
• Also, I did not hear Oracle talk about the concept of "emergence" or some of the other key concepts discussed within the E2.0 community. Yes, the platform approach discussed by Oracle does allow for "patterns and structure inherent in people's interactions become visible" and for “contributions and interactions are globally visible and persistent over time" but the context was always about more structured and directed interactions. So I am not convinced Oracle (based on what information has been shared so far) fully comprehends the social dynamics of what E2.0 is all about.
• That said, Oracle's jump into the E2.0 competitive landscape will clearly position it against Microsoft and IBM. In some ways, the application integration offers Oracle a means to competitively differentiate itself from other platform vendors (IBM, Microsoft).
• Oracle is over-reaching however when it tries to jam so much into an E2.0 message (document capture and imaging?!) that smaller vendors such as Jive might be able to attract Oracle customers by touting its agility and ability to integrate with external consumer sites and deploy external-facing solutions for social computing.

This confusion over directed vs. volunteered participation reminds me of an earlier post on social software which I strongly recommend people read through again (or for the first time).

RESOURCE LIST

BEA Welcome and Oracle's Middleware Strategy Briefing

The BEA Welcome and Middleware Strategy Briefing is now available on demand. Learn more about Oracle Fusion Middleware and the important role BEA's products will play.

Recorded Tuesday, July 1, 2008
9:00 a.m. PT / 12:00 noon ET

Click here to view the webcast via RealPlayer.

Watch Oracle executives Charles Phillips, President, and Thomas Kurian, Senior Vice President, give an informative briefing on how the addition of BEA products to Oracle Fusion Middleware creates a best-in-class combination, advances a common vision, and reinforces Oracle's middleware strategy.

Events Overview

Enterprise 2.0: User Interaction & Portals

Oracle delivers the industry's only complete, open, and manageable portfolio of user interaction and portal products including Oracle WebCenter Suite (which includes WebCenter Interaction, formerly BEA AquaLogic User Interaction), Oracle WebCenter Services, Oracle WebLogic Portal, and Oracle Portal.

Oracle WebCenter Suite and Oracle WebCenter Services are Oracle's strategic solutions for developing Enterprise 2.0 enabled portals, composite, and web applications. Oracle WebCenter Suite is a comprehensive collection of user interaction components that can be used to create out-of-the-box enterprise portals and highly customized web-based applications. Oracle WebCenter Services enriches any standards-based Web interface with advanced Enterprise 2.0 user interaction services for community based interactions, web analytics, content management, and social networking.

Oracle plans to continue to develop and support Oracle WebLogic Portal and Oracle Portal, and expects to converge these products with Oracle's strategic solutions over time. Existing deployments of these products will benefit from complementary products such as Oracle WebCenter Services and Oracle Content Management.

Learn more about the role of Oracle WebCenter Suite and Oracle WebCenter Services in Oracle's middleware strategy.

Enterprise 2.0: User Interaction & Portals | Oracle Fusion Middleware

Oracle WebCenter Suite

Oracle WebCenter Suite is the industry's only complete, open, and manageable user interaction and portal platform that integrates Enterprise 2.0 capabilities into ad hoc and structured business processes, as well as custom and packaged enterprise applications. The suite includes components of Oracle WebCenter and Oracle WebCenter Interaction (formerly BEA AquaLogic User Interaction) and allows organizations to securely deliver Enterprise 2.0 services like wikis, discussion forums and RSS feeds through both out-of-the-box and customized portals. Oracle WebCenter Suite allows enterprises to enhance information worker productivity through a highly scalable, centrally managed platform that uses open standards to integrate with existing IT systems.

BENEFITS

• Complete—Comprehensive development framework and a rich set of Enterprise 2.0 services supports the creation of flexible and extensible portals and composite applications that meet the full range of business requirements
• Open—Support for industry standards and hot-pluggable compatibility with existing information systems extends the value of existing IT resources and skill sets and provides an open alternative to proprietary architectures
• Manageable—Centrally managed architecture seamlessly scales from workgroup to enterprise-wide deployment and is integrated with best in class web analytics and system management tools

WebCenter Suite | User Interaction | Oracle

WebCenter Services

Oracle WebCenter Services provides standards-based components that enrich existing portals and Web sites with the industry's most complete and open set of Enterprise 2.0 capabilities. These Enterprise 2.0 services are also available as part of Oracle WebCenter Suite and include community based interactions, online awareness and communications, content management, web analytics, and social networking. Oracle WebCenter Services enable organizations to use their current portals and web sites to empower their end users with Enterprises 2.0 services that work with their existing information systems.

BENEFITS

• Bring Enterprise 2.0 to your existing portals—Provides componentized services such as wikis, blogs, discussions, RSS feeds, virtual content repository, web usage analytics, and contextual enterprise search

• Open Standards based—Support standards including JSR-168, JSR-170, WSRP, AJAX, REST, RSS and SIP

• Minimize disruption and risk—Integrated and secure services work with each other and with your existing IT systems

WebCenter Services | User Interaction | Oracle

Enterprise 2.0 Bootcamp - Oracle Wiki

July 28, 2008 | Oracle Conference Center, Redwood Shores, Calif.

Web 2.0 technologies and techniques like wikis, blogs, tagging, social networks and mashups are now enterprise-strength and being used by organizations to collaboratively work smarter. Leading companies are using these new technologies to grow revenues, spur innovation, and lower costs, but the overall impact on the organization needs to be well understood before embarking on the Enterprise 2.0 journey
Enterprise 2.0 Bootcamp is a free, interactive, 1-Day workshop for Oracle customers, partners, and users (and anyone else who wants to show up!) designed to educate attendees about the impact of Enterprise 2.0 on business today, in a highly participatory (unconference) format.
Have Enterprise 2.0 insight that you want to share? Come prepared to sign-up and lead an unconference session!
Topics can include:

• PR, Legal, Security, and Privacy
• Cultural Change
• Metrics and Measurement/ROI
• Internal Collaboration
• Outbound Marketing
• And more…

Enterprise 2.0 Bootcamp - Oracle Wiki

Web 2.0 Resource Library - Oracle Wiki

Make this wiki more valuable by adding your Web 2.0 insights, experiences and findings!

*Get started by clicking on the "Join This Wiki" button to set-up your profile.

Welcome to the Web 2.0 Resource Library. The intent of this wiki page is to give you direct access to a variety of useful information on the growing topic of Web 2.0…especially related to the enterprise.

To begin, we have included links to iSeminars, demonstrations, white papers and much more.

Web 2.0 Resource Library - Oracle Wiki