Web 2.0 - The Dark Side
by Carl Frappaolo
Let me start this entry by stating that I am one of the biggest advocates of Enterprise 2.0. I have written numerous opinion pieces on the powers of the Internet and the capabilities of tools such as SNA, KM, search etc. Nonetheless, I have to say that as I sat through many of the presentations at Fast Forward and read many of the entries in this blog I cannot help but feel that many are drinking the Kool Aid.
What am I speaking about? Well, many of the presentations and blog entries speak of Web 2.0 as unprecedented capability that will revolutionize business forever. I cannot help but recall how “web 1.0″ was touted as doing this (does anyone remember vortals?), along with numerous other revolutions - e-mail, EDI, groupware, KM, to name but a few - and I do mean just a few.
The powers of online collaboration, new approaches to search and content intelligence are powerful. But their powers are evolutionary, not revolutionary. Furthermore, they do not change most of the basic tenets of human psychology and business management (in this regard I side with Tom Davenport - see Experts Agree to Disagree). It is naive to think that Web 2.0 will take off all on its own, as so many other blog entries and Fast Forward presenters would have us believe. Indeed, this very blog site has a leader, orchestrated contributors, and a policy statement . Their role is not heavy handed, but it is there nonetheless. Any community needs an individual responsible for activity, ethics and relevancy. To allow truly free collaboration is negligent (I am speaking here of corporate blogs, not those blogs that are nothing more than the inane ramblings of “anyone”. Corporations need only look at e-mail and the degree to which it has complicated legal discovery to begin to understand the impact that blogs can have. I have worked with many regulated industries (e.g. pharmaceutical, defense), that share an implied culture of “watch what you write - not what you say.” The spoken word (not recorded) cannot come back to haunt you. But the written word, whether on paper or a blog, can. Business blogs need to be monitored. Rules need to be imposed. When I suggested this at an working luncheon at Fast Forward, someone challenged me stating “you do not trust your own employees.” How naive. Breaches in security, propriety and confidentiality come intentionally and accidentally. More importantly, we must ask ourselves, are corporate blogs records? Of course they are. Therefore they warrant the same scrutiny and management that any other potential corporate record does.
Perhaps this is why McAfee states “enterprises have to be convinced that the technologies are iron-clad secure and scalable.”
Secondly, and equally as important, corporations that want to maximize the return on Web 2.0 technologies need to control their introduction and availability, lest the “ugly portal in need of a taxonomy beast” raises its ugly head again. Consider this blog site. An individual new to the community may never fully appreciate the depth of knowledge that has been captured here. Navigation is limited to groupings by month and author. Contextual search is a feature that is difficult to “discover”. The power of the search tool is limited. It does not provide half of the functionality that was touted at Fast Forward. Web 2.0 technologies need to be orchestrated as part of an overall Information architecture, on an ongoing basis. As the needs and focus of the community change, so too should the blog site.
Analysts and technology providers that promise the powers of Web 2.0 without simtultaneously exposing the “dark side” – the need to align to corporate culture, to monitor and manage, to design and tactically deploy, do the market a great disservice.
