Web 2.0, Work 2.0 and Life 2.0
I am writing this with Flock: it saves time. The Flock “social browser” launched version 1.0 (beta) today. It comes with built-in plugins for many Web 2.0 applications like Youtube, del.icio.us, ma.gnolia, Flickr, Twitter and Facebook. Web 2.0 is about “connecting persons” and “online participation”, but another important thing is that the technologies used by Web 2.0 applications (Ajax etc.) permit doing things faster. Sometimes the difference between being able to do something in one minute or five is the difference between doing it or not - there are always other pressing things to do.
I am on most professional social networks, for example Linkedin, Xing and Viadeo, but recently I am using Facebook also for professional contacts. Facebook is simply better as a software application and permits doing things faster. Now that Facebook is integrated in the browser I will be using it even more. Several other people I know who are mainly interested in social networks for their professional life are switching from professional networks to Facebook.
I have been thinking that an interesting side effect, at least for always-on people, will be blurring the line between personal and professional identities. Some business people will need time to get used to seeing a virtual teddy-bear, heart or birthday cake on the “professional” page of a business contact, but I find it refreshing (and a time saver). Once we used to carefully maintain different online identities and persona, but perhaps Web 2.0 means linking persons instead than partial personalities. A person is more complex than a family identity or a business identity, the whole is bigger than the sum of the parts, and who has the time to maintain different online personas anyway. Is this Work 2.0? And Life 2.0 may be forthcoming: a much more interesting life merged with virtual realities, with senses improved by augmented realities and, soon, the possibility to modify and enhance ourselves.
Another application that I am using more and more frequently is ma.gnolia - a next generation online bookmark manager. Simple, fast and integrated with the browser. It can also be integrated in Facebook (look for the ma.gnolia application) and external website. I have integrated my ma.gnolia bookmarks page in this blog.
Posted by G.P. on 10/19 at 02:41 PM