Vine - Microsoft's New Social Web Application

According to this article in eWeek Microsoft will launch a new Facebook/Twitter like application that is expected to blow them out of the water. Brier Dudley of the Seattle Times describes the app as,

"...a hyperlocal, personalized message and alert system. It's intended to be a dashboard that people can use to keep tabs of their family, friends, activities and major events in their community."

The app Vine is expected to be used first to alert people of schedules and changes. The idea for this came out of Microsoft's response to Hurricane Katrina, so Microsoft will be initially targeting first aid responders and local emergency officials. It shouldn't be too long though before we see this app being used in the enterprise.

Browsing the web I came across this presentation from Shiv Singh, the VP & global social media lead at Razorfish entitled Web 2.0 and the Enterprise: A Symbiotic Relationship. Early in the presentation he notes 5 reasons why it is a symbiotic relationship, and his 1st reason was “Facebook enters the Enterprise.”

This does not shock me as Facebook has been around for quite some time, and only now does it seem that the enterprise is finally beginning to realize the business benefits of social media. What are your thoughts?

Web 2.0 and the Enterprise: A Symbiotic Relationship

View more presentations from shivsingh. (tags: timeshifting trust)

Latitute: The Ultimate Mobile Social Networking

Yesterday, Google announced the release Latitude, which is deemed the next step in mobile social networking. Read Write Web is a way to track where your friends are using your mobile phone. Read Write Web then goes on to question if users are going to feel like Google is too much a part of their life, and they already use other social networking sites like Facebook on their phone. What do you think?

LinkedIn Launches “Enterprise” Applications

Larry Dignan posted today on ZDNet that LinkedIn has recently unveiled its application platform where it allows developers to offer business-oriented software. But unlike Facebook that provides many time-wasting apps and games, LinkedIn will provide a bigger focus on business essentials.

LinkedIn will be handpicking the applications that will be available on the platform. For now, some of the developers include Amazon, Box.net, Google, Huddle, Six Apart, SlideShare, Tripit and WordPress. Although a lot of these applications are not completely focused on the enterprise, it’s off to a better start. I’m interested to see what the next couple of months will hold in store for apps on LinkedIn.

Small Business Owners and Social Media

This afternoon I came across this post on ZDNet which discusses the findings of a recent survey conducted by online payroll service SurePayroll. According to this survey, 55 percent of 120 small businesses surveyed believe that online social networking like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter are extremely beneficial to their business. One of out 5 businesses surveyed even mentioned that they have gained at least one new customer because of social media. Interesting stats…

Even smaller companies are beginning to discover that social media is not just only for personal use; it is a must for business success. The survey provides information on small businesses reaching a customer base through online communities, but where are the stats for benefits for small businesses on using social media internally? Does anyone have any input on the usage of enterprise 2.0 in small companies?

IBM is Bringing Business Networking Closer with Bluehouse

This post on ComputerWorld discusses how IBM has released Bluehouse, which merges social networking features with business collaboration tools. At first, Bluehouse will be free during the initial beta period, after testing has ends the SaaS product will be subject to subscription pricing, which has not been determined yet.

Like Facebook, Bluehouse will combined many collaboration tools such as instant messaging, document sharing, profiles, and tools to build business networking opportunities. One thing that will be different from Facebook is that Bluehouse has management features to help ensure privacy, and this is a feature that businesses have been looking for. Sean Poulley, vice president of IBM's online collaboration services seems to think that the current economic situation will encourage consumers to adopt SaaS with its subscription model. What are your thoughts?

Microsoft Officially Done with Microsoft….so what’s next?

Reuters reported yesterday that Microsoft has fully stopped pursing Yahoo!, and now looking on to the next step. Microsoft’s Online Division has posted losses eight straight quarters and lost $1.23 billion last fiscal year. This is approximately 5.5% of Microsoft’s operating income. After this, they will now look to conquer the online world by looking at the deal they have with Facebook. The software giant will now provide web search and search advertising in addition to the graphical display ads they’ve already got running on Facebook. However, this endeavor will be limited to United States profiles.

Facebook Connect and Corporate Websites

This post by Jeremiah Owyang, Senior Analyst from Forrester Research, showcased some interesting views on potential avenues for Facebook Connect in the corporate world. Facebook Connect is similar to OpenID in that it allows visitors to third party websites to login with their Facebook ID like a “Passport” system. It will also give third party websites the ability to embed some code onto your website, and provide users with the opportunity to share their activities on their newsfeed. What makes this an interesting application to watch, as the article points out:

“Facebook Connect will allow corporate websites to allow users to authenticate, interact, and share with their Facebook network – all without leaving the corporate website. Boring, static corporate websites can now become social”

It will be interesting to see how many corporations adopt use of this tool to improve social interactions within their own company. Would you consider this an appropriate stepping stone for Facebook?

Social Networks to Improve Your Company’s Bottom Line

Enterprise networking still receives a fair amount of skepticism in this day and age. Most companies fear that employees will waste time and that overall productivity will decrease. Despite major criticism, this latest article on eWeek discusses how Wachovia, the nation’s fourth largest bank, is launching an enterprise social networking site for its 110,000 workers.

The real value of enterprise networking shines the more it’s used. Wachovia envisions a knowledge management system where employees can not only build relationships across departments, but where they can easily collaborate, share ideas, and locate information. This will be done through blogs, an in-house encyclopedia and an intricate intranet made accessible through a Facebook-like service.

Burton Group analyst Mike Gotta, analyst at Burton Group mentions:

"Social networks improve the ability of people to do their work.”

Web 2.0 applications in the enterprise make it easy for employees to get together online and offline on projects. Workers can easily combine expertise from across departmental boundaries which were previously unattainable through a social enterprise. Traditional organizational charts and the nature of organizational hierarchies are changing with each growing day. Out with the old and in with the new.

Embrace Social Media in the Enterprise

According to article on Computing, a study conducted by Gartner has found that businesses should make more use of social media and web 2.0 applications within the enterprise to better communication with their employees.

Nikos Drakos, a research director at Gartner and a supporter of social media in the enterprise, mentions:

"With websites such as Facebook and other web 2.0 technologies such as blogging and forums, businesses have an open opportunity to promote themselves amongst their employees, and more importantly to customers. For example, if there was a Facebook group about a certain company or a product, they could intervene against negative postings or use the positive postings as a marketing asset."

Companies are slow to adapt to this trend though, and most organizations are still very skeptical about adopting social media practices within the enterprise. We’ve discussed how blocking access to social media sites like Facebook could actually decrease worker productivity. The premise is that by balancing job and life responsibilities at work, employees can focus more on job tasks at hand. The question still lingers, is there true business value? Only time will tell.

Restricting Access to Social Software Sites Could Reduce Employee Productivity

Not only does blocking access to Facebook decrease collaboration within the enterprise, it reduces job satisfaction which leads to poor productivity. Web 2.0 is here to stay, so organizations must then adapt to it, instead of restricting access. This article on CNN explains how by balancing job and life responsibilities at work, employees can focus more on job tasks at hand.

While it might be tempting for employees to “poke” a friend or two during work hours, the business benefits outweigh and negatives allowing access to social sites might bring.

A 12 Step Guide to the benefits of Web 2.0

In a recent article at CIO Australia, they address the challenge of bringing Web 2.0 tools into Australia. Since this country is showing that they aren’t adapting web 2.0 as fast as the rest of the world, they give tweleve simple steps in order to encourage the adaption.

There are many reasons that CIOs are failing to adopt this process, but the magazine states one very important thing:

Organizations must increase their Web 2.0 awareness and capabilities now to prepare for the storm of innovation to come."

It only takes a few changes in the company in order to bring this huge collaborative machine into the picture, and CIO sees it:

"I believe the most important challenge for the CIO is to make the key decision makers in the company aware and to ensure Web 2.0 becomes increasingly embedded in their current and future strategy," Relihan says.

Training is not difficult, most of the tools used are already in common practice outside the workplace, and are seen as time wasters.

"If you want to find out what tools your staff are finding most useful at the moment, just go and see what your IT department is blocking."

The twelve guide to getting the most out of Web 2.0 into your enterprise are:

1. Wake Up Call at the Top – CIOs need to acknowledge that this is the computing and collaboration of the future.

2. Settle the Ownership question – Who calls the shots? Is it the upper level management or the IT department?

3. Borderless creativity – The value of these tools is still emerging and letting itself be seen. It can foster creativity throughout the organization whether the employees are sitting across the world from each other or on two separate continents.

4. If you’re not blogging how will you know what people say behind your back?

5. Consider the dark blog -- Companies are still figuring out how to control the blogs safely behind the firewalls. But employees can be the most valuable source of the information that flows from the blog

6. Push Co-Creation – According to this article, many CIOs see social networking as a waste of time. With the power of Web 2.0 tools, companies can be aided in inventing, developing and sending to new products to market faster due to the fact that they can communicate with other companies to see what they have done to make their enterprise work.

7. Beware of the stealth attack and stay alert – Know excalty which tool are correct for your business. If the wrong social networking tool is used, it could cause many problems throughout the enterprise.

8. Know what mashups will mess you up – Since two different web sources are combining in order to create one piece of information, the wrong source of information released could cause trouble. This could be a source of security problems, therefore it is important to know exactly what to use in these powerful tools.

9. Use web 2.0 for talent attraction and retention -- Most companies block these tools on the internet because they believe it is a great way for employees to waste time. But, if older generations and younger generations come together to work on these applications together, the possibilities are endless.

10. Use it for green computing—These tools allow people to access information faster, leading to a reduction in the need of power for computers. The carbon emissions dramatically decrease if computers are used right.

11. Use it to fix enterprise search – Many times, employees find it easier to find the information online than on the intranet. These tools can correct that.

12. Accept That Good Governance Reduces Exposure – The board and upper level management are the key to the success of these tools. With the correct guidance and exposure, these tools can lead to massive amounts of collaboration and innovation that could not otherwised be found without web 2.0 tools.

Enterprise Social Networking: It Has Value!

There is a constant battle sage brewing over the concept of including an enterprise social networking application within organizations. Top level executives have been arguing whether it has any real business value and IT departments claim it brings about too many security risks. As the new generation of young executives rise into power, social networking apps like Facebook, Plaxo, and Google will become increasingly popular collaboration tools in the enterprise.

I came across this article on ZdNet, which includes a thought from Harvard Business School professor Andrew McAfee. He explains why certain Enterprise tools are still not being accepted in organizations:

"We need to keep in mind that most E2.0 tools are new, and that their acceptance depends on shifts in perspective on the part of business leaders and decision makers, shifts for which the word ‘seismic’ might not be an overstatement. Enterprise 2.0 tools have no inherent respect for organizational boundaries, hierarchies, or job titles. They facilitate self-organization and emergent rather than imposed structure. They require line managers, compliance officers, and other stewards to trust that users will not deliberately or inadvertently use them inappropriately. They require these stewards to become comfortable with collaboration environments that “practice the philosophy of making it easy to correct mistakes, rather than making it difficult to make them” as Jimmy Wales has said. They require, in short, the re-examination and often the reversal of many longstanding assumptions and practices. It is not in the least disrespectful or contemptuous of today’s managers to say that it will take them some time to get used to this."

Out of all Web 2.0 tools, social networking still receives the most skepticism. In our previous post we discuss how companies like BEA have incorporated a Facebook-like social solution to ease collaboration and sharing of documents, and how Salesforce.com has launched its social networking platform Ideaforce to share ideas on product development. If companies like these can find value in enterprise networking, other businesses are missing out on its benefits. Clearly, organizations are slowly catching on, but not quick enough...

Are you tired of the applications on Facebook?

A solution has finally come. In this post at ReadWrite Web, they point out a new application they’ve found so you can block all application requests except friends, groups and event notifications. At Ignoreall.com, after installing their application there will be more requests to join the vampire group or join the virtual cocktail party. Now your professional Facebook profile is one click closer.

What do CEOs have to say about Facebook?

A recent post at ZD Net lists the reactions to twelve CEOs and their view point on Facebook.

Nicholas Bellenberg says he doesn’t see it as a business tool:

“It doesn't strike me as being a business tool. I am signed up to LinkedIn and Plaxo. LinkedIn seems to be used most by the people I know, and does seem to generate useful connections or re-connections. Plaxo doesn't seem to do much for me, apart from provide the promise that my contacts are backed up somewhere."

The ICT manager at European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Studies, Floretin Albu uses many social networking sites, and Facebook has the lowest scores:

"The most useful tool for me is by far LinkedIn. The only drawback is that it is largely US and UK oriented. My business is pan-European, and for the EU space I found Xing [ex- OpenBC] to be more effective and popular than LinkedIn. The drawback of Xing is that it is also somewhat less flexible than LinkedIn.”

Paul Hopkins, who is the director of ISS at the University of Newcastle, had a different spin on the subject:

"For all of us 'oldies', Facebook et al seem awkward and don't fit our way of working but I would urge IT managers to persevere--because this is the environment that your new employees will be expecting to use. I would urge people to look at the possibility of developing some simple Facebook apps for their customers, suppliers or staff to use."

Personally, I feel that it is risky to mix business with this application. Personal lives should not be judged when it comes to business work. The new generation of employees grew up with this application through out college, and has a different view of how it is to be used. We’ve asked many times before, but do you feel Facebook should be used in corporate settings?

More on Alfresco

Last year, we posted about Alfresco and their use of Facebook as a wiki. See that post here at our old blog. In a recent post at Mashable, they discuss how this company is growing. They just announced that they received an extra $9 million in funding from SAP Ventures, as well as funding from Accel Providers and Mayfield which totaled $19 million.

What makes Alfresco different from all the other companies trying to bring Web 2.0 to the business world is that they work with everyday applications already in the office. They focus on brining new application to Facebook (like creating document collaboration tools for the platform) and Google. This is shows that they want to bring these applications to the enterprise now. Not in three years with a new program.

Alfresco’s business is picking up, according to CEO and founder John Powell. They’ve already had clients that include top ten investment banks, Electronic Arts, KLM and H&R Block.

Facebook evolving

In a new article on CNet, the divulge that Facebook is making several changes to the way they operate in the first quarter of 2008.
They are:
-- Friend list privacy controls
-- Facebook in new languages
-- Blasting messages to groups with more than 1,000 members

The business world has been waiting for the first change. Now, will this propel Facebook up the list of preferred networking sites for professionals?

The move for Facebook to create more languages is obvious. Obviously, it is used around the world, but now that they are creating a new way for users to read in their own language, membership should climb.

And finally, Facebook will add messaging a group with more than 1,000 members. It will serve a need that business lookers have been searching for, the ability to spread news and communicate as a whole group.

In a post in December, we wrote about Serena Software and how they use Facebook as their corporate intranet. So now, we might not only see Facebook as a way to network with other professionals, but we will begin to see corporations use it on a daily business. With the ease of collaboration that Facebook provides with groups and communication, mass messaging employees will now be possible. Will this encourage companies to adapt Facebook, not to mention that now employees will be able to separate their personal life from their professional life, as well as the ability to message everyone together?

Enterprise 2.0 on the Move!

It brings shear satisfaction when I get word that companies are beginning to embrace the Web 2.0 movement, despite some of its skepticism it has received regarding office efficiency within the past couple of months. While reading CIO Today’s article we can still see that many businesses still block access to social networking sites like Facebook that hinder business development and effective collaboration between employees. The informality of blogs, social networking sites, and wikis attract the brightest employees and maximizes internal communications.

Fortunately, we see giants like Gartner, an I.T. research firm, embrace Web 2.0 tools and applications. This is how Jorge Lopez, industry research chief at Gartner, defines a business in the new age:

"A high-performance workplace combines technologies, processes and management so workers can create more value. This area integrates multiple technology perspectives, including collaboration, information access, content and knowledge management, messaging, portals, e-learning and productivity tools."

With the growing number of young executives entering corporate America, Web 2.0 tools will become more and more accepted as time goes on, especially with industry giants such as IBM, Cisco, Microsoft, and now Gartner making bold moves. The key is to keep employees motivated, and that means giving them full access to exploit blogs, wikis, and social networking sites.