Portals and KM

Is Online Video Moving to Look More Like Television? Or the Reverse?

Here is another angle on the convergence of TV and the Web. The digital marketing firm eConsultancy asks the question, Is online video destined to look like television programming? They quote Brian Stelter in The New York Times: "News Web sites are starting to look a lot less like newspapers and a lot more like television." Brian also writes that online ads are booming, if they’re attached to a video.

They report that traditional television has been impacted by commercial fast-forwarding, but with online it does not work quite the same way. And as much as people complain about pre-roll ads, they are increasingly watch them instead of skipping through them.

Digital video earned $477 million in revenue in the first half of 2009, which is an increase of 38% from the same time period last year. By online standards this may seem small as online search is estimated to be a $10 billion market this year. However, this growth is good news for struggling media companies. Especially since online views are not poaching traditional TV viewers. During the daytime, online is popular, but at night viewers are switching to television. I think people will switch to online videos as a diversion while working on their computers but will prefer the bigger TV screen for more devoted recreational viewing.

I have written elsewhere that traditional media cannot not simply reproduce itself on new media (see Here is a Creative Blend of Mainstream Media and Social Media and The Misplaced Fear of the Mainstream Media) and this post agrees. It points out that in the longterm, merely reproducing TV content online at a quicker pace is not likely save the networks. They quote Todd Teresi, chief revenue officer at Quantcast: "We need to get to solutions that are as elegant as search. The power of the search marketplace is that Google does not sit there and tell you what you should buy. Google gave people control. That fundamentally is why that marketplace works so well."

I wonder if traditional TV will ever gives us the same control and the online world? It could be a very powerful move. Will hardware be the driver or content?  (see TV Moving Closer to Mobile Phones and the Web). 

Entering the Social Age: Review of The Social Factor by IBM's Maria Azua

 The old adage, knowledge is power, has been transformed in the social age to “sharing knowledge is power” according to Maria Azua, author of The Social Factor.  While I agree that the new saying has taken on increased importance within Web 2.0 and enterprise 2.0, the old saying still holds.  With the new transparency and the tools to mind this content, both obtaining useful knowledge is even easier and making decisions on when to share has become easier. 

I was pleased to receive a review copy of The Social Factor with the subtitle: innovate, ignite, and win through mass collaboration and social networking.  Maria Azua is the vice president of cloud computing enablement at IBM. The book begins with an interesting history of communication technology and innovations. I picked up some new bits. The Associated Press or AP was formed by newspaper publishers with the advent of telegraph. They recognized the profit potential of instantaneous worldwide news bulletins. I wonder why these same institutions began in such a passive way during the beginning of the Web. This newer global communication technology was first seen as a threat by many traditional communication channels and they are only just beginning to be more innovative in its use (see Mainstream Media versus Social Media? Not Really the Right Question and The Misplaced Fear of the Mainstream Media).

The telephone was able to spread more quickly because it rode the existing telegraph infrastructure. There is an interesting chart on the pace of technology adoption in the US. She compares technologies from the industrial age on how long it took to achieve 70% household penetration.  The industrial age technologies include: autos, 82 years; telephone, 55 years; color TV, 42 years; and electricity, 34 years.  The information age technologies include: computers, 24 years; VCR, 20 years; cell phone, 16 years, and internet, 14 years.  Times are approximate based on how well I read the chart. You can see the accelerating rate of adoption. 

My grandparents were around during the auto, telephone, and electricity adoption phases and they tell some interesting stories about the early stages. My grandfather wanted to return his car as it was not as smart as his horses, until he thought to teach his daughter to drive so he could sleep on the way back from his medical rounds.  Now we have GPS but the car is still not as smart as the horses, just much more effective. My great aunt was able to simulate the benefits of teleconferencing, ambient awareness, streaming audio, and expertise location when she was the first telephone operator in her small town.  Now the telephone cannot do much of this but the Web can.  I wonder what stories we might tell our grandchildren about the transformations we observed as we move from the Information Age to the Social Age.

In an excellent case example of enterprise 2.0, Maria reviews Rheinmetall. There were three primary drivers of the use of social media within the enterprise: enhanced employee recruiting in the generation that has become used to social media on the Web, leveraging this Web social media experience within the enterprise, and supporting the increased desire for collaboration in research efforts. The concept of the networked organization supplementing, and/or replacing the hierarchical organization is also covered. This is very similar to Jon Husband’s concept of wirearchy. Organizations that recognize the power of this approach and use social media to enable the new channels will be the winners.

There is much more in the book including chapters on wikis, blogs, tagging, cloud computing, and cultural implications. It is a good thought provoker for those implementing enterprise 2.0 

Comcast Getting Ready for Web and TV Convergence with its NBC Merger Plans

Comcast’s well-publicized attempt to acquire several cable networks (CNBC, Bravo, and the USA Network), a leading Hollywood movie studio (Universal Pictures), and a major broadcast television network (NBC) will impact how we watch television.  However, it may be that forces are in play that will drive these changes and Comcast is just positioning itself to between ride the new wave as TV and the Web converge.

Mark Guarino at the Christian Science Monitor recently discussed the move in “Three ways the Comcast-NBC merger could change television.” He outlines these impacts: more content, fewer subscriptions since the new company would have both Hulu and Fancast to access online content. There will also be more ne-stop viewing. Like AT&T, Verizon, and other carriers, Comcast offers bundled deals involving broadband internet, cable, mobile, and landline phones. Finally there will be more online viewing outside the television. Comcast will be able to integrate its cable, Internet, and mobile phone services with its new library of content, allowing subscribers to access a vast number of TV shows and movies in new ways.

All of these impacts reflects the Web – TV convergence and will only provide further support for it. I found the quote from Paul Levinson, a media analyst at Fordham University in New York especially telling, “In the next five years, more people will be seeing ‘The Tonight Show’ online than on their television sets.” The convergence will be so extensive that in 10 or 15 years, we won’t be talking television screen versus online because they’ll all be the same screens.”  This is what we have been saying for some time and it sets the stage for an online TV schedule search engine such as TVissimo.

We look forward to seeing how this unfolds. Rick Munarriz, senior analyst for The Motley Fool noted that some 95 percent of Comcast’s current revenue comes from cable subscriptions – a business model that is “not sustainable,” he says. Targeted ad revenue can come through a search engine such as TVissimo as it knows what people are looking for and obtains a profile to match against these moves. 

Forrester Discusses Barriers to Intranet Use and Suggestions to Get Better

Forrester recently released a report on What’s Holding Back Your Intranet? by Tim Waters with Matthew Brown and Sara Burnes. They were kind to share a copy with me. They found that 93% of employee respondents said they use an intranet or company portal (Forrester uses the terms interchangeably) at least weekly, and more than half reported daily use. However, they found that these intranets were mostly accessed for basic functions such as company directory, benefits information, and payroll. Access to collaborative tools, what some might called an enterprise 2.0 capability was ranked fourteenth. 

At the same time studies have shown that a highly functional intranet can provide great value. A 2009 study at BT found that every £1 invested in the intranet produced £20 in exploited value. This certainly is consistent with my experience implementing such system in the late 90s. Despite this firms are underutilizing their intranets. They found several reasons. 

First these intranets are hard to use. Where is an AJAX interface when we need it? In fact, Forrester reports, “Most enterprises at least try to offer usable online experiences to their prospects and customers — but continue to inflict user-hostile internal systems upon their employees.” Nothing like a cobbler’s children syndrome. 

They also found that there are few incentives to change established work habits that night increase productive usage. Since It is often in charge of the intranet they think in terms of IT-centric intranet teams such as reduced storage costs rather that helping workers do their job better. IT is not usually measured on this. Most current intranets also do not reflect and support the specific roles and responsibilities of their users. The one size fits all approach is consistent with an IT centric intranet as it is easier and cheaper to maintain. 

Forrester wrote that the “symptoms of an ailing intranet are not hard to recognize: poor adoption, irritated users, failed tasks, and ingenious (but unproductive) workarounds in order to avoid the intranet altogether.” I have seen this over and over again as I interview people who moved to social media and away from their intranets. Serena even replaced their intranet with Facebook. Océ is moving massive amounts of information off their intranet. 

Forrester suggests that improving the intranet starts with taking the users’ perspective. I could not agree more. They offer a number of useful suggestions in the report, including a set of criteria to review your current intranet

Painting of Early Fall Garden and Rock Wall

Here is a 24" x 30" acrylic painting of some Mums and double Impatiens (lower right) in a garden lined with rock wall. I was working on the contrasting light.

Painting of Roll and Coffee

Here is a 12' x 12" acrylic painting of my breakfast, a roll and coffee. I actually got two versions. One to paint and one to eat. This and all the others at my Art and Photography Blog are for sale. 

 

Television’s Survival Might Rely on Hyper-Local Coverage Online

MediaPost recently reported that Akamai Technologies CEO Paul Sagan warns that television is about to experience the major impact that print and music have already felt. Akamai Technologies facilitates more than one-fifth of the world's Web traffic so they have a good view on the subject. What will cause this transformation? The article states that, “the ability to match high-def TV picture quality with Internet interactivity is creating a sea change for online video that will begin rippling through the television industry in 2010. Only TV station owners that leap to the new arena, playing the strength of their hyper-local connections, will survive.” Otherwise they will feel the same big impact form the Web that music and print have felt.

I am reminded of a past transformation in news coverage when the telegraph first appeared, the news outlets of the day came together to form the Associated Press to capitalize on the new technology and share its promise.  It does not seem that a similar event will happen here. Now it is everyone for themselves.

Traditional television content producers and distributors that are among Akamai's deep client base are in peril according to Sagan. The audiences for this content are rapidly moving to the Web. The article goes on to report that, “too many broadcasters are obsessing about cannibalizing their content instead of using the efficiency and convenience of interactivity to expand their local power base. While increasing numbers of TV stations are going online with real-time and on-demand local news, sports and other live events, they do not have the interactive online advertising in place to fully monetize their content.”

This sounds like what happen to the Rocky Mountain News.  There is a way out. Television content producers can take advantage of the ability of the Web to address the long tail of specialized content.  The large players are global and generic. Sagan says that “the window is still open for broadcasters to create long- and short-form programming that -- when expertly presented and searchable -- can be monetized and generate a new audience and new revenues.”

However making effective use of interactive advertising is essential for hyper-local online broadcasting to become a viable business.  They are not there yet but must make the transformation to realize this opportunity.

Another success component is effectively harvesting breaking news about local events to generate this hyper-local content. Often local stories first break through “non-professional” reporters on little known sites. This is where Darwin Ecosystems’ Awareness Engine™ can help.  Through it you can mine the long tail and discover interesting relationships between stories that enable you to provide added value to breaking news. 

Happy Holidays 2009 - 2010

 I hope everyone has a great time celebrating the end of 2009 and the start of 2010 in their own ways with friends and family. I look forward to continuing this blog in the coming year.  I will be starting the year with commentary on several prediction posts. 

 

Specialized Search is a Next Big Move for Search

I have been discussing specialized search a bit (for example, see: Will Yahoo's Changing Search Strategy Cause it to Pick Up Niche Services?). Well, Yahoo is not the only mover in this direction. As reported by Venture beat, Google is planning to launch a music search service with music sites Lala and MySpace-owned iLike, according to multiple reports. Of course, Google offers other specialized search services such as blogs. There are also many specialized search tools entering the market such as Attivio, Exlead, and MindServer

The article states that with this new service, you will be able to search for a musician, then play songs streamed from partner sites like Lala and iLike. CNET describes the goal as providing ╥everything a music fan may need when searching online for a favorite artist, while TechCrunch says the pages will be modeled on Google results for public company searches.

It goes on to add that this sounds like a smart move for both Google and the music companies, giving Google a cool new service without requiring the it to host the music or strike deals with the record labels on its own, while bringing more exposure to Lala and iLike.

I certainly agree and feel that specialized search services are one of the next major directions with search. The Google page rank approach has been around for some time. It keeps getting refined but you can take it only so far.  It was a huge improvement over what was available. But you still get many false positives and lots of stuff to shift through. Specialized search can get you there faster. 

Darwin, a firm I am part of, offers both an alternative to the Page Rank approach but it also allows you to set your own level of specialization. You can search on a general basis like Google or set a very focused attractor and specify the area within the Web that you want to focus. It can be formal or informal.  You find out more at our Darwin Discovery Engine blog. 

Mainstream News Take on Social Media Directors

Dirk Smillie wrote at Forbes.com in Journalism's Hottest Job that there are now about 200 social media directors at newspapers, book publishers, magazines and television news stations. Most started in the last two years. He writes that, “Rarely offline, their job is to tweet, ping, blog and friend-find throughout the day, building and interacting with new audiences, promoting media brands and sometimes breaking news.”  I have been talking about the relationship of social media and mainstream news for a bit (see Social Media Does Not Replace Traditional Mainstream Media and Social Media Helping TV Stations Attract More Viewers and It Could Change Way TV News Created).

Dirk goes on to question whether simply tweeting the news is a money maker. He points out that most newspaper RSS feeds don't carry ads; neither do blog posts or tweets that break news and adds that Lynn D. Johnson, senior vice president for social media at the Advertising Research Foundation, says news organizations aren't earning "anything significant" from social media. This is where the mainstream news needs to get creative. They should not simply reproduce the old media content in the new media. For example, social media can be a useful means to drive traffic to your regular, ad laden channel. A Seattle TV station took over the top TV news ratings spot when its news staff tweeted to establish a better connection to their audience.

Dirk concludes his post with a quote from Woody Lewis: "Whether news organizations believe in its potential to make money or not, they see the train leaving the station and don't want to get left behind. They know that social media is where users want to be." Woody writes the blog, "Save the Papers," which debates how mainstream media can use social media to survive. They certainly need to be more creative in how they broadcast their content with all the new options open. They need to lead readers and viewers to revenue producing channels as well as add revenue to the new channels.

There is another way that mainstream media can use social media. They can better mine it for breaking news and trends. Using the Darwin Awareness Engine ™ we observed a few weeks ago that social media was all over the Lou Dobbs story at least a week before the mainstream media.  Social media creates a vast amount of interesting content. For example, as early as 2005 news people were turning to bloggers for story ideas.  The Awareness Engine can provide greater control and flexibility over how you mine this data. 

Putting More Fun in Your Enterprise 2.0 Efforts

It is the holiday season where you should be putting more fun in everything. Rex Lee did a nice blog post, Maximizing Business Value from Enterprise 2.0 through Fun & Motivation.  I did a FastFoward post on it but could not resist from including it here and adding some more as I think the message is essential. Rex begins with scientific premise that providing financial rewards to people for knowledge-based tasks is counter productive.

Rex offers an excellent video from Dan Pink that argues that while rewarding people for many simple work tasks from the 20th century and before might increase performance, doing it for the cognitive tasks of the 21^st century does not work. The reason is that it narrows the focus and does not promote the exploration of options that can occur with other motivations. I have also found that it undercuts the team sprit and sharing that collaborative organizations need.  Our recent economic downturn also shows that it puts too much weight on individual achievement even if it is counter to the success of the whole organization.  

I think this makes sense.  If you try to use performance incentives to promote enterprise 2.0 adoption, you need to be very careful that it does not reward the wrong behavior.  It certainly needs to be aimed at overall team success if used at all.

So what does Rex offer instead? He writes, why not fun.  Here I am completely onboard. I have often been involved in knowledge management implementations where we introduced fun as part of the awareness campaign.  I will work even more if it makes the work more fun, such as meeting new interesting people to collaborate with and finding out more about your colleagues. In a minor way this is why I like to work with music as I get caught up in the rhythms of the sounds and works seems more fun.

Rex closes with a great video from Volkswagen that seals the deal. It shows how if you make one channel more fun it will trump the easier, formerly more popular, one.  We should add the spirit of this approach to our enterprise 2.0 implementations. It should only help. 

Painting of Two Tomatoes on a White Cloth

Here is a 16" x 20" painting of two fresh tomatoes resting on a white cloth. It was done with just red, white, and blue with a little yellow. This and all the others at my Art and Photography Blog are for sale. 

 

Monica Bhide Provides a Great Blog and Books on Indian Spices

 Monica Bhide writes the blog, A Life of Spice, and has written the cookbooks, Modern Spice: Inspired Indian Flavors for the Contemporary Kitchen - Simon & Schuster, 2009, The Everything Indian Cookbook: 300 Tantalizing Recipes--From Sizzling Tandoori Chicken to Fiery Lamb Vindaloo - Adams Media, 2004 and The Spice is Right: Easy Indian Cooking for Today - Callawind Publications, 2001.  

My friend Don Lesser recently did a guest post on her blog commenting on Modern Spice.  He wrote that it refreshed his cooking. Don started with the simple fennel-chili dry rub, a great topping for grilled steak or chicken pieces which I think is an excellent suggestion. I was especially excited by the Eggplant and Tomatoes with Cilantro, Indian Style Chili and the Tomato and Coconut Fish Curry with a side of Zucchini and Yellow Squash with Cumin. I will attempt to convince Don to make these the next time I visit.

The illustrations on Don’s post and the rest of the blog are excellent. This blog and her books make a useful introduction to Indian cooking. 

Don also has a great food blog of his own, Russelnod, “From the way we ate then to the way we eat now.”  Don does restaurant reviews for his local paper and I liked his recent post, Reviewing Restaurants without Really Reviewing.” He says he does not write reviews– “I don’t give stars and I don’t trash places, both commonplaces of the reviewing biz. I write stories about the restaurant, interview the chefs or owners after I’ve eaten there, and tell you what to expect.” I have been with him on one of these trips. He does not accept getting “comped” for the meal and takes an very objective stance. Here is my report on our Dinner at the Gypsy Apple in Shelburne Falls MA and Don’s - Gypsy Apple Bistro. 

Andrew Filev Picks 33 Blogs about Innovation, Project Management and 2.0

Andrew Filev, CEO at Wrike, an enterprise 2.0 project management software firm has picked his favorite blogs for innovation, project management and 2.0. There are a lot of good ones on the list.  They are arranged in alphabetic order and he wants you to vote for the top ten. Now I was pleased to find this blog on the list so if you like what you read here, a vote would be appreciated.

I have written about Wrike before but have no other connection with them but they do have good project management software (see Wrike: Flexible Enterprise 2.0 Project Management). 

Collaboration Seen as Top Driver of Enterprise Content Management Investments

I recently received a review copy of the Forrester report on 2010 ECM investment projections. Stephen Powers and his team surveyed 170 knowledge managers with decision-making roles in enterprise content management about their plans for the coming year. The team found that 72% of respondents said their organizations plan to increase ECM use or the number of ECM deployments in the next 12 months, while only 4% of organizations plan to scale back ECM use or number of deployments.

It is good to see that organizations will continue a steady investment in ECM. More interesting from the enterprise 2.0 perspective, 61% cited content sharing as the most important driver for investment in ECM. Other top drivers include compliance (51%), improved search (45%). This makes sense and fits the enterprise 2.0 paradigm of transparency and collaboration.  It also reflects the continued concern over regulation and associated compliance and search certainly plays a large role in compliance.  I have seen much progress made in the search space and the enhancement of enterprise collaboration suites so these investments are becoming more attractive. The report suggested than the role of collaboration will only increase.

The report when on to say that while enterprises desire an end-to-end ECM suite that covers all content needs, in actuality they continue to have multiple ECM point products and/or suites in place. More than half have over 3 vendors in place. The report predicted than there will be more ECM integrations to compensate for the hybrid environments.

Return on investment (ROI) remains an issue as a majority of firms can’t prove ROI. This may make approval for ECM investments more difficult. However, these investments continue to improve knowledge worker productivity, at least in terms of output, as the amount of content enterprises produce continues to increase.

There is much more in the report and you can find it at the Forrester site. 

My Favorite Tweets for December 1 - 14 2009 from @billives

Here is the fifth in a new series of posts that provide access to my favorite tweets that contain links to useful information.  Some of these I did to link to things I found useful and others are RTs that I want to save for the same reason. Since Twitter archiving is an oxymoron, I am now going to post my favorite links for the month so they can be easily accessed later. I will repeat this once or twice a month depending on volume.

I spot tested the reduced shortened urls and they all should work. I hope this is also useful for you.  Let me know your favorite tweets for the month.

Also see the Darwineco favorite tweets.

Smokey Robinson, Rod Stewart and Elton John providing backup to #Aretha on Chain Of Fools http://bit.ly/4GkZur Dec. 14

Social Media Checklist for Small + Med Size Businesses http://bit.ly/7378zO via @SBoSM Dec. 14

RT @gsiemens: social media policies in 100+ organizations: http://bit.ly/8JjEcr 9:06 PM Dec 13th

RT @DavidGurteen: How Adults Achieve Happiness http://bit.ly/84Lw9k 9:56 AM Dec 13th

RT @GeorgeDearing: Editorial - Twitter Tapping - NYTimes.com http://ff.im/-cPDBA 10:36 PM Dec 12th

HT @digiphile: "I felt a great disturbance in Blogosphere ..."~@slashdot http://j.mp/7MRGcd 9:19 PM Dec 12th

Judges and lawyers in Florida can no longer be #Facebook friends http://bit.ly/7aLm3C #socialmedia 9:12 AM Dec 11th

 Top 10 Enterprise Products of 2009 Via @readwriteweb http://bit.ly/5d4y9Q 4:53 PM Dec 10th

good Twitter lessons learned http://bit.ly/6m1LfU via @SBoSM 2:24 PM Dec 10th

 RT @ariegoldshlager: Influence of Zealous Employees [on Sales Growth]: http://post.ly/EfS0 see 4 other twts on topic #scrm #e20 9:30 AM Dec 10th

 RT @hebsgaard: Observations from #Gilbane Boston 2009 http://bit.ly/70UXly thx @lehawes 5:23 PM Dec 9th

 Dell has $7M in global product sales on Twitter http://bit.ly/7HWlq6 3:12 PM Dec 9th

 Measuring the Business Value of Enterprise 2.0, Using Enterprise 2.0 from @joemckendrick 3:04 PM Dec 9th

 see @jonhusband on What Does “Socially Calibrated” Mean as an Element of Social Business Design ? http://bit.ly/7XrbLR 6:24 PM Dec 8th

more 2010 predictions via @SBoSM http://bit.ly/88A05P from @shivsingh 1:39 PM Dec 8th

Google Launches Real-Time Search http://bit.ly/8Fh20r 9:11 PM Dec 7th

RT @darwineco: Gartner points to "untapped" value in workplace-based social networks http://bit.ly/85RKfz 6:08 PM Dec 7th

Making most of Google Sidewiki from SBoSM http://bit.ly/5nz9oW 5:36 PM Dec 7th

Apple’s Game Changer, Downloading Now NYT http://bit.ly/8dqo5B 5:32 PM Dec 6th

RT @ariegoldshlager: Should we optimize ourselves for search engines? by @stevebaker http://bit.ly/8jz59O > need balance  Dec. 6

CIO Mag on micro-blogging within enterprise http://bit.ly/5qxNku via @SBoSM 7:03 PM Dec 4th

RT @gyehuda: New Blog Post: Framework for 2.0 Adoption in Enterprise. http://bit.ly/4Rh5T3 #e20 #20adoption 10:27 PM Dec 3rd

Three ways Comcast-NBC merger could change TV http://bit.ly/5lh2Yv more on Wev TV convergence 7:38 PM Dec 3rd

RT @amcafee: FT review of my book - http://bit.ly/6kSvRR - states #E20 is a 'dream' evidence shows its failure. No evidence provided by FT 4:04 PM Dec 2nd

What To Watch In 2010: Social TV http://bit.ly/5LB9qd via @SBoSM 1:52 PM Dec 2nd

10 Totally Ridiculous Combo #Gadgets http://bit.ly/67aSDk 11:37 AM Dec 1st 

Reminder on Our KM Forum Session This Week

Thierry Hubert and I will speak at the December 17 meeting of Boston’s KM Forum.  We will discuss:Deliver Us from Web 2.0 Content Chaos: Activity, Attraction and Personal Knowledge Create the Awareness Engine™.  Here is the session description.

The presentation will share with the audience a practical application of chaos theory for creating knowledge focal points from the chaotic mess of content resources distributed across the Web. Using a couple of examples, one from the Internet where socially generated content is exploding, and one from the enterprise where social tools are also contributing their own content bloat, We will discuss the ideas that are driving a new product idea at Darwin Ecosystem. The examples will illustrate how activity can make information more discoverable, and easier to explore through various visualization techniques. These techniques open the door for more self-discovery through intuitive recognition of patterns. They will help the explorer to find relationships among content objects and people that would not have been found using traditional search methods.

We hope to see you there. It will be from 4 to 6 PM at the Microsoft offices, 201 Jones Road, Waltham, MA. Here is the announcement post on the KM Forum blog with directions. Here is more about Darwin Ecosystem and how it works. 

How Best to Collaborate within Enterprise 2.0?

Jacob Morgan asks this question in his post, Collaboration in the 2.0 Enterprise. He begins with the broad Wikipedia definition of collaboration. Then points out that while collaborate may be relative simple when it involves a few people, what happens when it involves a few thousand people as in the connected 2.0 enterprise?

Since it may be hard to get everyone collaborating at once, how do you segment this into meaningful groupings? He offers some possibilities such as by geography, departments, and user created subgroups. Perhaps you might segment by feature sets or functionality, as well as. In this case certain people get wikis or microblogs.

I think the answer is all of the above. Most importantly, people in large organizations should have the opportunities to form their own groups. This approach has meet with great success at Booz Allen, for example.  Rather than organize collaboration along existing organizational charts than are subject to change, they organize it around communities of interest that reflect the capabilities of the organization and the needs of the market it serves. This allows for organic growth.

Since people can join more than one group they should also be able to collaborate in the many ways they form groups within the enterprise. In some cases, this might be by geography or department. A number of the collaboration suite allows for multiple ways to look at content and connections.

I think that feature or role use should be governed by task rather than role or position. Océ takes a proper approach as they try to educate employees on when to use what enterprise 2.0 tool for what purpose.  Booz Allen takes a similar approach with their change management efforts.

The challenges in implementing enterprise 2.0 are more around question such as the one Jacob raises to take proper advantage of the new capabilities the tools offer. 

Enterprise Mashups Summit – San Francisco - January 15

The SF Bay Area & Silicon Valley Network will present an Enterprise Mashups Summit on January 15, 2010 at the San Francisco Sate University Downtown Campus
835 Market Street.  It goes from 8:30am - 5:00pm.  Speakers include Deepak Alur, Vice President Engineering, JackBe Corporation; Olivier Poupeney, Co-Founder & CEO, Dreamforce; Raymond Yee, Lecturer, Author, UC Berkeley, School of Information; Matthias Zeller, Group Manager, Adobe Systems; Michael Ogrinz, Principal Architect, Global Markets Technology, Banc of America Securities, LLC (and author of Mashup Patterns); and Ann Majchrzak, Ph.D.
Professor of Information Systems, Marshall School of Business.

This is a nice mix of vendors, academics and a user. I have written about the mashup alliance that JackBe is involved with (see JackBe Leads Formation of Open Mashup Alliance to Advance Adoption of Enterprise Mashup Solutions). Mashups continue to be strong in the enterprise 2.0 space and this event should be useful for those who want to explore it further. 

Photographs of Stonington Connecticut on a Summer Day

Another reminder of summer. Stonington is located on a small peninsula the sea coast near the Rhode Island border. Here is what it looked like this past summer on a warm August day. Water Street, the main commercial street, has a lot of flowers.

Two Paintings of Eggplants on a Red Plate

Here are two 18" x 24" acrylic paintings of two eggplants on a red plate on a white cloth. The top one goes to the detail level. I often start by putting in the base colors ands then adding the details, highlights, shading, etc.  In this case I decided to stop the first on at the flat color level as a "logo" style painting like you might see on a old wooden crate. Then I did another, staring where the bottom one left off.  These and all the others at my Art and Photography Blog are for sale. 

 

  

Consumers Increasing Their Use of Social Media To Discuss Brands

Tealeaf provides online customer experience management  (CEM). Their CEM solutions include both a customer behavior analysis suite and customer service optimization suite. I have written about them before (see: Understanding Your Online Customer's Moves with TeaLeaf). They also sponsor an annual Online Consumer Survey. Here is my post on last year's survey (Online Customer Experience - What is Going On?) The 2009 survey has some interesting results.

What struck me most is the way consumers are increasingly likely to share their experiences and opinions about companies, rather than with them. They are using social media to do this. The rise of Twitter is one vehicle but there are many others that have been around for a while such as blogs and forums.  I have even tweeted about a brand myself and was pleased to see them respond (Conmcast).

Here is the data: 26% of online adults who experience problems conducting online transactions posted complaints on a company's Website in 2009, down from 32% in 2008. At the same time 38% of all online adults contacted a company╒s call center after encountering problems using the Website in 2009, down from 47% in 2008. In contrast 12% of online adults who encountered issues said they shared those experiences via blogs or social networks, twice as many as in 2008.

This 12% may seem like a small number but the survey also reveals that these shared experiences are highly influential and should therefore be a real business concern. More than half (54%) of all online adults said social media content has influenced their online transactions, with 82% of respondents said social media has influenced their choice of vendor.

The survey goes on to say that online adults whose transactions have been influenced by social media content actually respond to positive reviews (26%) more so than negative ones (21%). So it pays to create good reviews and opinions about your products online. 

This all has a major business impact since in it is estimated that in 2009, $47.6 billion will potentially be impacted by online transaction problems, on U.S. shopping websites alone. This impact comes in various forms. For example, 51% of consumers would not buy from the same brand if they had a problem online with them. Most of us experience some problem although this is slightly improving. The 2009 survey reported 80% of adults have had a problem shopping or getting services online but this is down from 87% the year before.

The Web may be the new frontier of business but results like these reminds u of both the current impact, the potential, the long way we have to go to reach a more mature market, and the need for companies to participate to survive and prosper. 

Success Factors in Adopting Cloud Computing from Software AG's Miko Matsumura

Many people have written that cloud computing will become pervasive in the enterprise and I certainly agree. Recently, I spoke with Miko Matsumura, Vice President and Chief Strategist at Software AG and author of the Wiley book “SOA Adoption for Dummies” about how mature organizations can best adopt cloud computing. We also covered some related enterprise 2.0 adoption issues. I liked what he said so I am cross-posting this from the AppGap. 

Miko said he is working on a long paper on cloud adoption and shared some of the thoughts he is working on. He began with a definition of an enterprise as an organization that requires size, and longevity to carry out its mission.  This has implications for IT. First longevity tends to create IT segmentation and silos and this leads to complexity in IT supply. Size and growth create organizational fragmentation that leads to complexity in user demands on IT.  These factors can impact IT strategies. For example, SOA can be a rational response to simplify the complexity of IT supply but it can fail to address the complexity of user demands in not implemented correctly.

Miko puts these complexity factors in a 2 x 2 grid.  Organizations tend to start in the simple supply and demand quadrant. The ideal situation would be a simply IT supply that can meet complexity users needs. However, most organizations have developed a complex IT supply before all of their complex user needs had emerged. So, lacking a green field, this approach becomes difficult. If there is already a complex IT supply, the cloud can add to complexity, rather than simplifying it.

Now I asked Miko how can you be successful in this typical situation. He replied that several factors need to be present. First you need a mature understanding of how the behavior of the organization connects to the mission. This requires strong leadership. Then you need an enterprise IT architect that reflects this understanding. Unfortunately, most IT architectures are limited to IT issues and not business issues. It is not about optimizing IT, but optimizing the business.

This lead us to a discussion of process. Miko said that processes are done at the micro level. Part of the challenge for an organization is to become best in class in the many niches that their processes inhabit. Processes are often done in a silo and not at the enterprise level. The goal should be to align these silos but not to tear them down. Miko said that the goal of enterprise 2.0 is not to break down silos but to align them allow for cross-silo communication and collaboration.

This makes a lot of sense to me. It reminded me of some work I was involved within the early 90s that was done in the spirit of enterprise 2.0 but with the tools of the day. In a property casualty insurance company we created new processes for underwriting, claims and sales. The best practices of the organization where embed in individual applications. Then these applications were aligned and connected.  We were trying to break down silos of communication but not silos of processes and applications. These latter two types of silos were essential for efficient processes and should not be destroyed.  Now alignment of silos along a value chain is an enterprise level task and can benefit from enterprise 2.0 approaches.

This line of thought took us back to the question of cloud computing. To be successful it needs to recognize and deal with the complexity of user needs and the alignment of silos, but not the destruction of necessary silos.  I am sold. 

Web Passes TV to Achieve Biggest Ad Revenue in UK

The UK has become the first major economy where advertisers spend more on internet advertising than on television advertising, with a record ú1.75bn online spend in the first six months of the year according to the Guardian.  The paper notes that this change marks a watershed for the embattled TV industry, the leading ad medium in the UK for almost half a century (or perhaps a waterloo). It has taken the internet little more than a decade to become the biggest advertising sector in the UK.

It is somewhat ironic to read this in another embattled media that is being challenged by the Web (see for example, Who killed the Rocky Mountain News? John Temple at WebCom 2009). The Guardian reports that the Web now accounts for 23.5% of all advertising money spent in the UK, while TV ad spend accounts for 21.9% of marketing budgets. I wonder what percentage traditional print newspapers account for.  Also, it would be interesting to see what portion of the Web advertising comes from online versions of newspapers and what percentage of newspaper ads revenue is from print versus online.

The survival of traditional media was a topic at the recent Webcom 2009 in Montreal, see Who Killed the Rocky Mountain News?  Our firm, Darwin, provides a way for news organizations to use the Web to their advantage by discovering stories beyond the expected.  My colleague Thierry Hubert presented a number of examples of this in his presentation, Case Study H1N1: Collective wisdom is emerging from Web chaos.  

My Favorite Tweets for November 15 – 30 2009 from @billives

Here is the fourth in a new series of posts that provide access to my favorite tweets that contain links to useful information.  Some of these I did to link to things I found useful and others are RTs that I want to save for the same reason. Since Twitter archiving is an oxymoron, I am now going to post my favorite links for the month so they can be easily accessed later. I will repeat this once a month if that timing seems to work best. I may adjust the timing. 

I spot tested the reduced shortened urls and they all should work. I hope this is also useful for you.  Let me know your favorite tweets for the month.

Also see the Darwineco favorites tweet

RT @JohnEstrella: RT @JohnFMoore 25 blogs to follow to keep up with #social media http://bit.ly/4KiM2H Nov 27

RT @GeorgeDearing: Are Twitter & Facebook evil? (http://bit.ly/6v4Vmz) [GlobeTechnology] #socialmedia > good cautions 27

Inc. 500 CEOs Use Social Media for Business http://bit.ly/4Q1oND via @SBoSM 1:41 PM Nov 24th

Foodspotting - this is a great idea - http://bit.ly/56maP9 via @psfk #food 9:40 AM Nov 24th

RT @marciamarcia: Micro-Forecasting?! http://sn.im/Mad-Science cool science! from IBM Social Media team. Thx @karenlilla 9:45 PM Nov 22nd

via @fgossieaux: 5% increase in customer loyalty increases customer life time value by 75% - http://bit.ly/4q8Vno 8:34 PM Nov 21st

nice article on Twitter lists and brands http://bit.ly/3r3Xuq 1:03 PM Nov 21st

UK police using twitter to fight crime http://bit.ly/1bm8v via @SBoSM 1:57 PM Nov 20th

RT @GeorgeDearing: Does working from home make you more productive? Yes (with data)! « RescueTime Blog http://ff.im/-bJfdX

New Orleans pizza place uses Twitter to push sales http://bit.ly/3UM5dY via@SBoSM

RT @GeorgeDearing: What Twitter's New List Feature Means for SMBs http://ff.im/-bC9eX 6:59 PM Nov 17th

Customer Contributions Build Preference good read from @conversationagent http://bit.ly/1OxrJG 2:02 PM Nov 16th  

nice read from @jonhusband Looking to the Past for Enterprise 2.0 Adoption Principles http://bit.ly/31IOr1 11:07 AM Nov 16th

RT @Jason_Pollock: "@TIME Magazine Launches Own Tech Blog " by @Zee http://bit.ly/TIMEtech 11:50 PM Nov 15th from TweetDeck

Our Upcoming Session at Boston KM Forum on Chaos Theory and Information Discovery

Thierry Hubert and I will speak at the December 17 meeting of Boston’s KM Forum.  We will discuss: Deliver Us from Web 2.0 Content Chaos: Activity, Attraction and Personal Knowledge Create the Awareness Engine™.  Here is the session description.

The presentation will share with the audience a practical application of chaos theory for creating knowledge focal points from the chaotic mess of content resources distributed across the Web. Using a couple of examples, one from the Internet where socially generated content is exploding, and one from the enterprise where social tools are also contributing their own content bloat, We will discuss the ideas that are driving a new product idea at Darwin Ecosystem. The examples will illustrate how activity can make information more discoverable, and easier to explore through various visualization techniques. These techniques open the door for more self-discovery through intuitive recognition of patterns. They will help the explorer to find relationships among content objects and people that would not have been found using traditional search methods.

We hope to see you there. It will be from 4 to 6 PM at the Microsoft offices, 201 Jones Road, Waltham, MA. Here is the announcement post on the KM Forum blog with directions. Here is more about Darwin Ecosystem and how it works. 

The Crab Houses of Maryland’s Eastern Shore

A few weeks back I read a nice review of the Crab Houses of Maryland’s Eastern Shore in the New York Times. They first focused on Waterman’s crab house, a place I dined a few years ago. The writer starts with the sentence, ““YOU’RE going to want the jumbos, hon,” my waitress said as she stood, pen poised over her pad, next to my unadorned pine picnic table on the crowded outdoor deck.”

This was exactly my experience. It was if a bossy but caring aunt was waiting on you. My waitress even took apart a crab and put some of the meat on my plate with her bare fingers. It was the first time a waitress had handled my food directly but I did not mind. What was slightly amusing was her assumption that I did not know what to do with the crabs. I grew up eating hard shell blue crabs in New Orleans and could have done the same demonstration. But inquiry was not part of her manner.

The crabs were wonderful and reminded me of my childhood. The NYT article has some great photos. Be sure to click on the link to see them. The eastern shore is nice part of the world. I rented a small boat with an outboard motor at a reasonable price and tooled around. I look forward to returning.

Still Life Painting of Potatoes, Onions, and Garlic on a Red Cloth

Here is a 18" x 24" acrylic painting of some red bliss potatoes, yellow onions, and garlic. I cooked them together afterwards. It is a revision of an earlier painting: Still life of potatoes, onion and garlic with cumin.  This and all the others at my Art and Photography Blog are for sale. 

Tweeting Your Weight - But Not Mine

Here is the perfect holiday gift for the person who has everything. It is also a sure sign that something may be happening, but does Mr. Jones know what it is? As reported in the Los Angeles Times, a French company, Withings, has equipped a bathroom scale with wifi so you can send you weight and body fat ratio to Facebook and your web site. Withings provides weight graphs and body composition analysis that are instantly available on your iPhone and on the web. There is even a video demo on their web site. I will pass on this one. 

Now they added a Twitter feature so you can tweet your weight.  Which Twitter List should this one be placed on?  Which holiday gift list? 

My Fast Forward Posts for November 2009

Here is the monthly listing of my Fast Forward blog posts. I find it helps me with an archive and hopefully is also useful to you. There is a separate category for these summaries in my right side column on this blog. There will be more in December.

Mainstream Media versus Social Media? Not Really the Right Question.

Burton Group: Many Organizations Have Yet to Make Enterprise-Wide Decisions on Social Networking Technology

Cloud Computing Adoption Success Factors from Miko Matsumura

Fundamentals of Enterprise Search: KM World Session Notes

Resetting the Enterprise With 2.0 Collaborative Tools: KM World Session Notes

The Role of Social Techniques in Search & How It Impacts Your Organization: KM World Session Notes

Is Semantic Technology Real?  KM World Session Notes

Some Useful Ideas for Twitter Lists

I recently posted my initial Twitter Lists and we also created lists for @darwineco. Here are some useful Twitter List ideas from others. First, Rob Paterson posted, Twitter Lists – 1st Insight?  Among other things he wrote, “What I have immediately seen from the new lists that are emerging around …(my) related areas of my interest is that I have some real gaps. Those that created the lists whom I like care for and admire have people that I don’t know and who don’t know me.” This has also been our experience both in our own personal Twitter feeds and the Darwineco one.  We have been listed by some people that we were not aware of and on all of the lists that mention us we have found new people with common interests.  As a result I am now following new people either through my lists and/or directly.

Twitip offered ways to create an extremely useful list.  It wrote to create a very specific list name. This has been our practice. You should also promote the twitter list elsewhere. This is a general good practice for social media. They suggested that you link to twitter lists from your blog, especially a company one. We are doing this at the Darwin Discovery Engine Blog and I also put a listing on the side bar of this blog. .

They also go on to write about 8 things to consider using Twitter Lists. You can use it as an extension of the TweetDeck groups function. This has been our case as it was easier to create new topic specific lists than creating new TweetDeck groups and wading though all the people we are following.

One easy way to do this is to look at lists on the topic that others created and they with a single click you can pick people you like and add them to your list on the topic. We found new people, as well as easy access to the twitter feed of people we know and want to follow.

You can easily identify what types of people users follow and you can easily get the tone of a group. The ability to scan over a list makes this possible, You can see what lists you appear on. This enables you to discover people with similar interests as noted above and reciprocate with the list creator.

Finally, I learned through Twitter (via @VMaryAbraham about 10 Twitter List widgets from ReadWriteWeb that you can grab and embed. They pointed out that addition to allowing users to create their own curations, Twitter has also added a basic widget-maker for adding tweets from any user's list to any given website. As a service they used this feature to allow access ten great lists Including one from Robert Scoble and one that is the entire ReadWriteWeb Team.

Twitter Lists continue to be an interesting way to bring more awareness to what is happening on the Web. I will come back to this topic again.  

My App Gap Posts for November 2009

Here are my App Gap posts for November. In addition to the Fast Forward blog (see side bar for links), I am writing in another Corante blog, the App Gap, The posts began toward the end of January 2008.  In this case, I am primarily doing product commentaries with a few other things thrown in. This month I added some KM World sessions that looked at applications. Below are the ones for November. There will be more in December.

Equivio Releases Relevance™ to Enhance eDiscovery

JackBe Leads Formation of Open Mashup Alliance to Advance Adoption of Enterprise Mashup Solutions

Darwin Ecosystem Brings Awareness Engine™ to Enterprise 2.0 eDiscovery

Attivio Aligns with Traction and Releases New Features

Enterprise Search Technologies: KM World Session Notes

Evolve From a Tactical E-Discovery Approach to Search and E-Discovery: KM World Session Notes