McKinsey Perspectives on Business Technology: Web 2.0

Web 2.0

3 March 10

These observations suggest that participation is here to stay, but stimulating continued high-quality participation is complex. It requires a subtle balance of rewards and effort, a thoughtful segmentation of participants and a comprehension of the social structures of participation.

The implication of connecting objects through the Internet

By Michael Chui

1 March 10

We have just published an article on the McKinsey Quarterly site about something we call the Internet of Things, i.e., sensors and actuators embedded in physical devices, connected by networks to computers that analyze the data.

With user participation, power laws still hold

By Jacques Bughin

1 March 10

Despite the broadening of participation, the overall ratio of contributors to users is still relatively low, and amongst contributors, only a few create the content that is widely seen, leaving a classic long tail of content generated by other users. Even now, up to 90% of the sentences typed into Wikipedia are left unedited. Previously, roughly 5 to 6% of total contributors generated the content that led to 80% of the audience consumption on social media sites, and today the same “power curve” remains.

User participation -- how the numbers are growing

By Jacques Bughin

25 February 10

A few years ago, the distribution of participation was skewed, with only a small number of individuals contributing significant amounts of widely relevant content on social media sites. A few years can make quite a difference. Participation rates have grown significantly, with many more opportunities to participate actively on a variety of social media platforms.

The promises, and challenges, of user participation

By Jacques Bughin

23 February 10

User participation is now an established feature of the economy, spreading from product development and software to a much broader base of activities, such as marketing and manufacturing, and sectors, including social media, automotives and cosmetics, among others. But is it living up to its promise and how do we do a better job of harnessing it?

Making data available to citizens

By Michael Chui

17 September 09

We are seeing a burgeoning of innovation in the application of information technologies in the public sector. One trend is the increasing willingness of governments to make their data available to citizens and other organizations outside of government through which they can create their innovative services. But just making the data available is not enough; it must be made usable by visualizing it in ways that create insight, or embedded into other tools. Several organizations advocating for greater government transparency are creating very innovative applications that visualize public data.

How Web 2.0 usage is changing over time

By Andy Miller

10 September 09

We have seen a steady increase in the adoption of Web 2.0 technologies by employees for internal collaboration and for communicating with customers. Interestingly, the percentage of companies using these technologies for connecting with business partners and suppliers has remained relatively constant over the three years.

Deriving value from Web 2.0

By Michael Chui

1 September 09

In our most recent Web 2.0 survey, we turned our attention to a question that many of our clients have been asking us: Where is the real business value from deploying Web 2.0? Our most striking result is that two-thirds of our respondents had derived measurable business value from their use of Web 2.0.

Tweets from the front line

By Kara Sprague

6 July 09

I wonder if Winston Churchill would still maintain that "history is written by the victors."

For several days now, the major news networks have been broadcasting near-continuous coverage of the turmoil in Iran over the recent elections. While the Iranian government has taken several steps to limit the information flowing out of the country through formal news channels, it has been far less effective in limiting information flowing out through social media - Twitter, mobile photos, video, etc.

A pause for Internet 2.0?

By Gordon Orr

19 June 09

One impact of the global recession that I see every day in Asia is an increased reluctance of Asian companies to open up, partner, share, outsource – pick your word – in reality anything that involves increased reliance on others. The simple logic being “what if they go bankrupt? Then where would we be?” It’s a new experience for these companies to spend time fretting about the financial viability of their customers and now their vendors. To have to worry about a legion of partners along with everything else, seems too much—and avoidable.