According to recent research of over 400 businesses, 44% of respondents said that
Web 2.0 is"imperative" or of "significant importance" for their organization.

- AIIM, Association for Information and Image Management
.

Depending on what you do in your "real life" you may or may not have heard the term "Web 2.0."
What does it mean and does it apply to us?
Web 2.0 is the catch-all phrase for the second generation of the Internet. The web has evolved and improved over time and now offers better and more up to date services like blogs, wiki’s, social networking sites etc.

[A wiki is] simple, contextual content. More archival than email. Less process than Word.

- Mike Cannon-Brookes, co-founder and CEO of Atlassian.

Web 1.0 refers to more corporate or institutional sites that are very professional and well-designed when they are new...but they quickly become stale and tired as the days, weeks, and months go by. If you spend a lot of time on the web, you may have noticed that many companies have created "fresher" websites by inviting users to participate via bulletin boards, blogs, users-helping-users, feedback scores, and other interactive elements. Wiki sites are a great example of user-created content that can updated, literally, in real-time.

The notion that a 100% professionally authored, locked down website will be relevant in 5 year’s time is patently absurd. People’s expectations are changing and they expect to interact and create content alongside professionally authored content. And audiences will want this experience as well. Sites that don’t participate will be left behind. While there will always be a place online for top-tier professional journalists and authors, time is short for websites that don’t invite and celebrate user-generated content that seamlessly exists alongside.

Wiki sites are collaborative. And because they are pull rather than push communication (that is, the user pulls the information rather than having the information pushed are her), they can actually reduce the amount of email we send and receive. (See Email versus Wiki for more on this.)

Although all these tools are gaining momentum, it's easy-to-use and practically free wikis that proponents say offer the promise of collaboration beyond e-mail. . . Internet research firm Gartner Group predicts that wikis will become mainstream collaboration tools in at least 50% of companies by 2009. . .the wikis eliminate the usual flurry of back-and-forth attachments and resulting document-version confusion that's rife in e-mail. . .among the earliest and most aggressive adopters, e-mail volume on related projects is down 75%; meeting times have been whacked in half.

- Business Week, "Email is So Five Minutes Ago" 9/28/2005

So what's your opinion? Is collaboration the next big thing....or is it just the latest fad? Use the THREAD section below to share your opinions.

PS: If you're wondering why we chose WetPaint. They have the largest network of nearly one million social sites consisting of half a billion total contributions --- and the site itself is free to the region; which is why there are advertisements on the borders.

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