It is when the buzz subsides that the real work actually begins and those serious enough to stick to an innovation when it is no longer fashionable truly begin to understand how to wring value from it and begin to obtain results."

— Gabriele Piccoli, Editor

I have now been associated with Cutter Benchmark Review for almost four years, and I can safely say that my favorite issues of CBR are those where we reflect on a trend or issue with analysis based on longitudinal data. Call it a professional bias after almost 15 years as an academic, but those issues are the ones that allow trending and reflection, grounded in data rather than speculation, and uncover truly valuable insight.

With this month's CBR we crafted one such issue on a topic that is losing some of the buzz surrounding it — and for that very reason may be moving into its most productive phase! Let me take a tangent here. Have you ever noticed how there are largely two broad sets of people: those who talk and those who do? OK, that may be an oversimplification (how uncharacteristic for an academic you may say), as there are plenty of variations between these two extremes, but go with me here for a minute. I'm sure you remember the many people you have met in your life who have told you how good they are, how much they have achieved, how close they were to getting that new position, and so on. Very often this façade of certainty and bravado hides a relatively thin record of real accomplishments; conversely, there is a broad group of extremely accomplished people who let the facts speak for themselves.

I think of technology promises in much the same way. I am typically very skeptical of those innovations that are shrouded in lots of buzz, more or less architected by people who don't even quite understand how the technology actually works. It is when the buzz subsides that the real work actually begins and those serious enough to stick to an innovation when it is no longer fashionable truly begin to understand how to wring value from it and begin to obtain results. I think this is happening with the likes of Second Life and other massive multiplayer online games. As Blake Ives, my former advisor and an expert on this subject (see the May 2007 issue of CBR¹), once wrote, those individuals "in-world" who are passionate about Second Life and are building the potential of that technology welcomed the sudden falling out of love of the press and public at large with the 3D Web.

It is for this reason — substance versus buzz — that I like reflective issues of CBR. In fact, we could convincingly argue that this reflectivity is at the heart of the value proposition of a benchmarking publication. While we like to be out there trailblazing innovations at times, our main role is that of evaluating and analyzing the state of the art. It is with this spirit that we approach our analysis of the current state of Web 2.0; our intention is to evaluate what happened since our first look at this phenomenon back in early 2007. True to form, the buzz surrounding the term has subsided (even though not as dramatically as for many other trends). Thus, if my (admittedly) simpleton theory has any legs, the real work is now truly beginning. Whether I am right or wrong, we at CBR thought it would be quite valuable to study the trajectory of evolution of Web 2.0 and related concepts within organizations. We felt that trending data, always valuable, is even more useful with emerging and consolidating trends where the shakeout and convergence toward a dominant design has yet to happen. It is this early trending that can provide valuable guidelines for organizations that seek to understand as early as possible how to best capture opportunities that the new technology affords.

Helping us navigate this topic is our returning academic contributor from the 2007 Web 2.0 survey: Joe Feller. Joe is a Senior Lecturer of Business Information Systems at University College Cork (Ireland) and one of my favorite CBR writers. He has been following the evolution of Web 2.0 since its inception. Providing our view from the trenches of business is Mark Choate, an author, educator, and interactive media development consultant.

Joe — who started his 2007 contribution with the best analysis I have seen regarding the definition of Web 2.0² — begins this issue by referring to that discussion rather than spending significant time on definitions. Yet, as a good academic should, Joe does not resist the temptation of clarifying some of the confusion still surrounding the term "Web 2.0." However, that discussion is limited and quickly propels us center stage to Joe's analysis of the data in his trademark conversational writing style. Particularly valuable is Joe's comparative analysis of the current results versus the original findings in 2007. In true CBR style, Joe ends his piece with a set of clear and actionable guidelines.

Mark, after a short digression on definitional issues, systematically comments on the survey results. He organizes his comments around perception, initiatives, benefits, and future developments. Of particular interest is his comparative analysis showing how Web 2.0 has evolved over the last two years. He then elaborates on the continuing development of social media as well as software as a service and cloud computing.

In closing my introduction to the 2007 survey I stated:

Even with its inevitable baggage of hype and its share of fast-talking, half-prepared pundits, I welcome the Web 2.0 phenomenon. I welcome it because it says, particularly to students and young professionals, that it is OK to be out there trying new ideas. It tells them that this IT stuff is not only about streamlining processes and wringing every single drop of value out the operation. IT can spur creativity, both the developers' and users', it can drive innovation and social change, and yes, it can be loads of fun in the process!³

I stand by those words today, with one added advantage; as buzz subsides we have to listen to less and less of the pundits -- now that's positive trending!

ENDNOTES

1 Ives, Blake. "Multi-User Virtual Environments: Vaulting from Virtual to Valuable." Cutter Benchmark Review, Vol. 7, No. 5, 2007.

2 Feller, Joseph. "Web 2.0: What, So What, Now What?" Cutter Benchmark Review, Vol. 7, No. 2, 2007.

3 Piccoli, Gabriele (ed.). "Web 2.0: A New Approach to the Web ... Or Not? " Cutter Benchmark Review, Vol. 7, No. 2, 2007.