Enterprise 2.0 Technologies

Enterprise 2.0 is not just about technology, however there are many technologies that are enablers for the Enterprise 2.0 approach. Descriptions of the most popular, and how they can be used within businesses, are listed below.

Blog

A personal or corporate website in the form of an online journal. New entries appear in sequence as they are written, Blogs are used to distribute frequently changing information, or ideas and opinions, often incorporating links to other articles. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs, forming a place for people to discuss ideas and share opinions

Examples of Blogs used in business:
- Project updates
- Corporate communications
- Idea generation/discussion

Wiki

A collaborative website that can be directly edited by anyone with access to it. Wikis are used to create spaces for collaborative authoring and sharing, they can provide affordable and effective Intranet, and Knowledge Management platforms. Full version tracking, access controls and revision histories make Wikis especially suitable for team-generated documentation. Wikipedia is probably the best known example of an Internet-based Wiki.

Examples of Wikis used in business:
- Corporate intranet
- Documentation repository
- Team authoring

RSS feeds can be subscribed to and accessed via a central application (known as a RSS reader) - this makes it easy for people to keep up with their favourite web sites (or blogs) in an automated manner, without have to visit each one to check for updates manually.

Examples of RSS used in business:
- Alternative to email to delivery communications, news, updates etc.

Social (or Shared) Bookmarking

Social/Shared bookmarking systems are used to organize, search, and manage web-browser bookmarks (also known as favourites). People save links that they want to save and/or share, and organize their bookmarks with informal tags. The combination of sharing and tags enables people with similar interests to uncover websites that they may have otherwise missed. This enables a far greater number of bookmarks to be effectively managed than the traditional browser-based folders approach.

Examples of Social Bookmarking used in business:
- Tracking and sharing for research groups
- Marketing analysis & tracking
- Individual bookmark management

Social Networking

Social Networking is the building of online communities (or networks) of people who share similar interests and activities. These services provide a collection ways for people to interact, such as chat, messaging, email, file/photo sharing, blogging, and discussion groups.

Examples of Social Networking used in business:
- Find experts via profiles and searching
- Form teams with the right skill sets

Mashups

Mashups are methods of combining multiple data-sources to deliver rich web-based content. Content used in mashups is often sourced from a third party via a public interface, RSS feed or API. The use of Google-Maps is probably the best known example of an Internet-based mashup, where websites display an embedded map on the same web-page as their location/address details.

Examples of Social Networking used in business:
- Combine data from new and legacy systems
- Enable end-user to combine information for analysis