A lot has happened in terms of where the technology has gone. The company takes a wait-and-see approach and then joins in. But this is good news for customers because they will see better integration and support, as well as clarity to some of the disconnected pieces. |
Business-to-business interactions come to mind here, because one IT department doesn't own all the resources. But if you can bring content to a centralized place, it is better to do so. |
Federation right now has done the easy part real well, which is single sign-on across trusted sites. As hard as it has been, arguably it has been the easiest part of what the industry could have taken on. So how far we get with federation this year is an interesting question. |
For one, they don't have access to the code. It's also very Windows-oriented. They looked around and decided Higgins was a decent place to land. |
IT professionals are in denial about what is going on among the desktops. They are not really in control of content and of what employees do with it. Peer-to-peer technology could give you better control or at least better knowledge of what is happening on the desktop. |
With products like Groove, you can collaborate with people outside your company, and you don't have to figure out who is going to set up a resource group. The IT people don't have to set up servers and punch holes in firewalls. |