Next week I'm attending an Institute for the Future event on their technology forecast.
Came across a sample report on Social Networks in the World of Abundant Connectivity (.pdf) that had this great comment on technology product design:
Social networks thrive on connectivity and the resulting opportunity for spontaneous interaction, on the ability to establish trust and selforganize around issues, and on the capacity to maintain latent relationships that may only be activated in response to a specific and unpredictable need. Most technology companies, however, continue to focus on building industrial strength infrastructures to support more formal organizations: e-mail, calendaring, enterprise portals, video and audio conferencing, multimedia communications, and so on. We believe that the real opportunities are in lighterweight tools that support ad hoc teams and spontaneous collaboration within social networks that often cross formal boundaries: instant messaging, phone-, pager-, or PDA-based short messaging, personal Web cameras, peer-to-peer file and screen sharing, and so on. These technologies typically require little infrastructure, completely blur the line between personal and business use, and ignore organizational boundaries. These are the technologies much of the younger generation is embracing. Rather than designing for formal organizations and with the goal of increasing office productivity, then, companies should design their products with social networks in mind.
Of course, this is before Socialtext, they have been talking abou this for a while. Their Future Now Blog is a must follow.
