Gartner blesses Web 2.0 (sort of)

Leapfrog Ventures' Peter Rip points us to a new Gartner report in which the tech analysis firm gives its imprimatur to Web 2.0 technologies, including mashup applications.  By placing them at the peak of its hypecycle Gartner is pointing out the obvious, without necessarily committnig to a lasting trend.  I would do the same.

In his blog Peter highlights the continuing discussion, led by Dion Hinchcliffe, about how Web 2.0 technologies will impact enterprise software infrastructure:

First, dispense with the sociology. Enterprises have two core attributes that do not exist as widely in the public web -- purpose and accountability.   So 'empowerment' and 'collective intelligence'  are not end points.  Nor are 'discovery,' 'networking,' nor 'sharing.'   These are embedded in processes and are methods for creating context to purposeful transactions.  A sales forecast is 'collective intelligence.'  Mining customer comments is a form of 'discovery.'  A internal blog post is more likely to be linked to a product release status than photos of my vacation. Viewed in this context, a lot of what passes for (aspiring) businesses in Web 2.0 are simply features of larger processes in the Enterprise. 

The key insight here is that enterprises are all about processes.  And enterprise software is all about process automation.  For now, my bets are on Web 2.0 technologies appearing in enterprise software as features, rather than displacing existing infrastructure or applications.  I have yet to see a lot of interesting new businesses that are using Web 2.0 technologies or concepts to target enterprise infrastructure effectively (except perhaps for Kapow Technologies :-)).  I would be happy to proven wrong, so please correct me if you know any...