Results

The popularity of social bookmarking applications and sites is leaking through corporate firewalls in the form of “enterprise bookmarking” systems. Traditional bookmarking sites, like Digg, del.icio.us, or StumbleUpon, allow users to bookmark sites that are of interest or of use to the larger web community. StumbleUpon, for example, installs a plug-in which visitors can use to rate their favorite sites, apply tags or keywords, and share their discoveries with other “stumblers”. Companies are now making use of this technology to start their own enterprise bookmarking cooperatives, which would give employees access to tagging and bookmarking tools for the purpose of knowledge collection and sharing. They are realizing that a search which results in thousands of returns is useless when it comes to information gathering. Enterprise bookmarking offers businesses a way to find what they want, when they want it.

Larger social bookmarking forums like del.icio.us display users’ favorite sites based on the number of people who bookmarked. You can browse popular bookmarks or search for specific keywords based on tags users have applied. Some of the most popular displayed on their homepage include an instructional video on how to tie a double Windsor knot, a recipe for chai ice cream, and a guide to conflict resolution in the workplace. Tags attached to these sites include “knot”, “Windsor”, “dessert”, “chai”, “relationships”, and “conflict”. Users completely control the content on these sites, including the tags. It’s another example of the Web 2.0 trend towards user-generated content on a large scale, and it’s being emulated by businesses searching for information sharing solutions within their network.

Many software companies are offering bookmarking platforms for business users. IBM Lotus has released an application called Connections 1.0 which gives users blogging, social networking, tagging, and bookmarking capabilities for the low price of $110 per user per year. BEA Systems has a similar product called Aqualogic Pathways which is offered for $40,000 per CPU. The goal behind these types of applications is to create a forum for employees to share knowledge, useful information, and connect on a personal level. Companies are aiming to create web-based corporate cultures; more and more are allowing corporate blogging, establishing presences on LinkedIn and Facebook, and encouraging employees to do the same. IBM and BEA are just two examples of software providers who are quick to meet these needs. We predict a future initiative which combines social bookmarking with Universal Search capabilities for diversified, relevant results in any medium.

Corporate networks or shared drives are often confused, tangled messes where documents and solutions are buried under mounds of out-of-date information and hidden by bad naming conventions. Technology like this empowers users to create an ecosystem of useful information that is a click away. Those working on the front lines of customer service (telephone and email support roles) will benefit most from this type of bookmarking because it will enable them to access a world of knowledge in just a few clicks. Social and enterprise bookmarking can have downsides, though. For example, allowing users to completely control the content could lead to disorganized, chaotic information management. Tagging is not always fully effective or accurate. A website or page might be labeled as both “wine” and “Sauvignon blanc”, but there is no way to note that one tag is a subset of another. Other concerns about security have been raised regarding classified documents or sensitive material being available for wide distribution. There will come a time when the technology will catch up with possible pitfalls, and businesses will have to decide how much freedom to grant employees in the meantime. For the present, those of us employed by companies open-minded enough to allow us access to enterprise bookmarking systems can consider ourselves lucky to have access to the virtual library of knowledge that is the web.

Wednesday, October 31st, 2007 Both comments and pings are currently closed.

By Haley January Eckels