Does enterprise 2.0 mean that time is up for Microsoft Vista?

BI 2.0, CRM 2.0, Enterprise 2.0 - read most IT journals and you would be left thinking that every area of IT is trying desperately to re-invent itself. If you were a cynic, you would probably put this down to software companies seeking to re-launch acronyms that never really lived up to expectations first time round. But the 2.0 'thing' goes deeper than that.

Hype-curves might be the bread and butter of IT marketers, but there is something genuinely different and somewhat more transparent about what's happening to corporate IT at the moment. It's nothing less than a user-driven revolution. You see, in most medium-to-large organizations, there is an enormous gap between IT departments and the business. This is not a new problem either - it goes right back to the dawn of business computing.

On one side of the page, development managers feel like they're constantly chasing moving targets set by line managers that don't understand what they're asking for. At the same time, the IT department is trying to keep up with 'what's new in IT' and prevent users from trashing the network. They know that keeping up with the ever growing in-box of development requests is not an option. So, as often as they can, they turn to shrink-wrapped, plug-in-able software applications that are fashioned around good practice processes. (This all sounds like good common sense until you realise that less than 40% of any software application is normally ever used and that the integration of these components across departmental silos can take as much time and money as it would to have developed the application in the first place).

On the other page is the business user community that is unsatisfied by the applications they received. The applications they receive do not reflect what they asked for. The resulting applications, formed around specific processes, create fragmented systems that don't talk to one another. More often than not, this leaves high performing people with underperforming information. Out of necessity, business people fill these holes in performance and usefulness by using spreadsheets, PowerPoints and word processor documents.

Enter '2.0'

The 2.0 era is about the liberalization of IT development. Its emergence is a clear indication that business users are no longer prepared to accept the stock answers from IT of 'It can't be done' or 'It can't be done that way' or 'Maybe in 6 months'.

2.0 is a handy tag that technologists are now consistently adopting to describe a wave of new approaches to solving old and familiar business challenges with ‘consumerized IT’ that non technical people can get their hands on to start shaping information systems to fit their specific needs.

New software tools are removing the need for applications to be authored by programmers. Line managers are able to take much greater ownership and control over the formalization of humanized information flows - to fit technology around the needs of the organization.

There are a number if building blocks that support ‘Enterprise 2.0’ - the aggregation of 2.0 technologies:

• Rich internet applications - At one time, web browsers were only able to support very basic presentation. Development in the methods used to feed more powerful presentation components to Web browsers (the most influencing of which is called Asynchronous Java And XML – ‘AJAX’) mean that highly intuitive applications - that you would previously only have imagined on your desktop - can now be deployed as services over the web.
• Mash-ups and composites application development tools - Software like Encanvas enables non technical people to design lean processes supported by 'best fit' information flows that embrace pre-built building blocks of functionality (like forms design, reporting, relational database authoring, GIS and business intelligence tools) that can bring data, user interfaces, application components and output formation together within a single desktop authoring environment to build new information management systems. Products like Encanvas bring together (1) Business Intelligence, (2) Data Management and Architecture and (3) Portal and Content Management in a single environment; all created without demanding any programming skills.
• Agile project model - Instead of old fashioned 'waterfall' project techniques (where development tasks - that at one time demanded a cacophony of different software development tools - are conducted in parallel) new software makes possible virtually real-time applications development 'across-the-desk).
• Control over information - Whereas information used to be the domain of computer people, the workplace today supports a much richer information environment with individuals demanding much more control over the way that they access, manage and share information. The challenge for business managers and IT is to find the balance between control and usability that creates the magical outcome of optimised workforce productivity.
• The ‘widgetization’ of the software industry – Instead of being about companies that build software applications shaped to support specific business processes, a globalized software industry is becoming more about the creation of ‘widgets’ – light-weight pluggable applications that slot into an open desktop environment powered by web 2.0.
  

What does ‘2.0’ mean to the software industry?

It’s easy to imagine that there will many more ‘widget-factories’, that exploit the skills of many thousands of independent developers working for many different companies in loosely coupled markets. The traditional application software vendor will all but disappear, as corporations move away from shrink-wrapped software, whilst at the top-end of the market, the big software players will continue to dominate and grow.

What does ‘2.0’ mean to Microsoft?

The dominant player of the software industry is facing its biggest threat yet. Unlike the bigger enterprise database vendors - Oracle, IBM and SAP – Microsoft has enjoyed its greatest success in supporting a user behaviour that favours desktop software and shrink-wrapped packages. The sudden move of an industry to consumerize IT means that Microsoft’s latest flavor of desktop software – ‘VISTA’ suddenly looks a high-risk and expensive purchase. Are corporations going to jump to VISTA when their people already get the majority of its value? Microsoft’s market position is suddenly looking outdated, and its approach outmoded. All that said, a corporation of Microsoft’s size and wealth always has the ability to react to market changes if aspires to do so.

What does ‘2.0’ mean to IT?

The ‘2.0’ experience does not threaten IT. After all, the standards that ‘2.0’ embraces are already known and trusted. What ‘2.0’ does is change the role of IT from its ‘defensive’ role as the protector of business continuity, into the attack role of providing competitive advantage by releasing the innovation and creativity of high performers in the enterprise.


What does ‘2.0’ mean to business users?

The greatest beneficiaries of ‘2.0’ are the business users themselves and line managers that are now in a position to translate their information needs into systems that really fit.

What happens next?

Expect to see the following ‘power trends’ occurring over the next 18-months:

1. The rapid development and expansion of the widget industry with major software companies starting to take widgets more seriously.
2. Slower than expected take-up Microsoft Vista.
3. Frantic pace of adoption for corporate-ready mash-up and composite applications.
   Re-definition of the role of IT.
4. Early-signs of a software industry going through globalization and a move away from shrink-wrapped applications.
   
   

Hats off to Nicholas Negroponte and his $100 laptop

Nicholas Negroponte is the founder and chairman of One Laptop per Child (OLPC) http://www.laptop.org established to provide children around the world with new opportunities to explore, experiment and express themselves. OLPC was founded by Nicholas Negroponte with a core of Media Lab veterans, but quickly expanded to include a wide range of exceptionally talented and dedicated people from academia as well as industry, the arts, business, and the open-source community.

The scheme is hoping to put low-cost computers into the hands of people in developing countries. Ultimately the project's backers hope the machines could sell for as little as $100 (£55). Test machines are expected to reach children in February as the project builds towards a more formal launch.

Ask any primary school head in any corner of the world and they will probably tell you that’s a good idea. Like Nicholas, I think the idea that school children are still being encouraged to learn through Microsoft products is ridiculous. Instead of finding new ways to share, communicate and express themselves, children are being spoon-fed their applications. And let’s be honest, these kids are not going to be using spreadsheets and word processors by the time they hit work. It’s only out of touch politicians that could possibly still think that they will.

Perhaps the $100 laptop and Encanvas will herald in a new way of educating children, where IT is absolutely embedded into the coursework of children. Encanvas provides a much better way of librating children from the straight-jacket of corporate business applications – because, using Encanvas, children can fashion their own applications in a way that embraces their personal creativity. Blending Encanvas with the $100 dollar laptop could be the next big step in embedding IT into the class-room across the world.

Good job Nicholas!