IBM "enjoins" companies to hire Netgenners

Thus reports Inquirer.net. It goes: "Companies must prepare to accommodate and learn to adapt to a new generation of workers that rely heavily on the Internet, according to a top IBM executive."

More here.

Somehow it seems like schools/universities need to play a major role in this "injunction".

But what if teachers are afraid of technology? 64 million dollar question ...

In praise of Social Networks

Big Blue seems to be officially riding the wave, in Asia - that is, especially when more and more people in this part of the world are seeing the viral nature of SNS (Think: Thriller video in a Cebu prison, or a jilted lover ranting over unpaid "cash advances"

Here's an excerpt from Inquirer.net

"PHUKET, Thailand--Social networks such as Facebook have not only revolutionized the way people communicate over the Web but are also seen as useful to businesses."

IBM's David Barnes tells us more in the video.

"IBM Launches Tool to Help Businesses Visualize Social Networks"

From what reads like a press release via money.cnn.com:

"IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced the availability of IBM Atlas for Lotus Connections, a corporate social networking visualization and analysis tool. IBM Atlas for Lotus Connections is designed to help organizations maximize their investment in social software by answering questions such as who the key experts are on a given topic, how they are connected, and whom a user's contacts know that they do not."

The main toolset elements are listed below:

"The Net component of Atlas provides a visual indication of the important hubs among topic experts and informal groups that have developed while working on similar projects."

" Reach, the social software dashboard feature in Atlas, helps users navigate the up to six degrees of separation that divide them from a colleague." "The Find component of Atlas builds upon core Lotus Connections expertise capabilities by taking searches beyond the corporate directory to include results based on social data such as reporting structures, blogs and communities."

Sounds like Friend of a Friend, tagging, folksonomies, etc from counterpart components in some popular Social Network Sites.

IBM adopts web ‘mash-up’ technology in new software

Thus reports Erwin Oliva saying that:

"[Big Blue] has released a new version of Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino that mixes and matches what customers want with existing applications."

More here.

Of course the Friendster Generation would know how to use those tools. Question is "Would they do that purposively? "

Now as to the "digitally aware" set who still comprises a huge portion of the existing workforce (schools included), the question is "Are they ready for the Friendster Generation?"

Seems like school reform is getting more complicated.

Enterprise 2.0 isn't a buzzword?

Perhaps two years from now, especially when people start raving about Enterprise 3.0.

Meanwhile, let's soak up what Jennifer Okimoto's presentation has to say, in Luis Suarez' slideshare:



[via Rich Hoeg]

IBM: really serious about Social Software

No doubt about it.

Check out Xing Premium to see what I mean.

"IBM throws weight behind OpenOffice"

Thus reports Lawrence Casiraya of Inquirer.net.

Here are some excerpts:

"IBM is contributing significant technology that will help make OpenOffice more accessible to those with disabilities," the statement said.

"In addition to actively contributing to and participating in the community, IBM will also include versions of OpenOffice in its products in the future."

Should be good for an ultimate move towards Webtop or Webware.

"Social software in knowledge-intense organisations"

In Jiri's Notes, Jiri Ludvik seems to suggest the need to take the Social Software talk to the next level. In particular, Jiri notes:

"Weblogs (& wikis) have been around for long enough for us to move beyond the experimentation stage and to come up with strategies on using them to make a real business impact."

Looks like it's getting more compelling by the day. Now my humble opinion is: Educational institutions really need to align skills training programs along this path.

And IBM does it from the top

... in Singapore. Click here for more details. It's called Blog4Biz. Something like that is happening from the bottom in the Philippines. It's called PhilNet.biz. Sounds like a "Spider and the Starfish" game play. And the challenge is finding the "Sweet spot". Question is when?

Knowledge Worker 2.0: Is s/he big or what?

Stephen Collins has put together an interesting slide show, chock-full of lessons about "how social computing can be a powerful people force for collaboration". Must be a good excuse to look at organizations as organisms.




I like this observation:

“...the focus is pretty much around the subject of people... And, like we all know, a successful KM strategy is one that combines into a perfect balance a focus on the people, on the tools and on the processes.” Luis Suarez, KM Consultant, IBM defines “Knowledge Management 2.0”

and this prescription too:

"introduce social software inside the wall to engage with your organisation and through the wall to engage with your clients, peers and communities "

[via elsua]

Social data analysis anyone?

Candace Lombardi reports that IBM's Many Eyes (alpha mode) project seeks stats freaks or junkies to build "collective intelligence" around data sets and visualizations that can range from baseball stats to Bible word frequency/count. I wonder how this can be useful for data mining social networks. Read more of Lombardi's article.