Are You Taking Advantage of Web 2.0? - New York Times

Are You Taking Advantage of Web 2.0? - New York Times: At a conference for the public-relations industry a couple weeks ago, I was asked to speak about Web 2.0—those interactive Web sites where we, the public, supply the material (Facebook, MySpace, Craigslist, eBay, YouTube, Flickr, TripAdvisor, and so on, not to mention blogs, podcasts and amateur video).

The Times's technology columnist, David Pogue, keeps you on top of the industry in his free, weekly email newsletter. "Before my talk, though, an emcee warmed up the audience with an exercise. He pointed out the wireless laptops on every table in the ballroom, and explained that anything typed on them would appear on huge screens. Using this instant-feedback mechanism, he posed P.R.-related questions to the attendees and commented on the responses as they appeared on the big screens."

One of them was: "Why isn't your company (or client) taking advantage of Web 2.0?

Pogue writes about reasons why not!

"Not enough money." "Don't understand it." "No technical resources." "Not enough manpower." "No visible return on investment." "Fear of ridicule." "Fear of slander." "Fear of permanence." "Fear of the public running amok."

"When a company embraces the possibilities of Web 2.0, though, it makes contact with its public in a more casual, less sanitized way that, as a result, is accepted with much less cynicism. Web 2.0 offers a direct, more trusted line of communications than anything that came before it," Writes David Pogue of NYT.