Social Glass

Update: Deki Wiki has had mashup capabilities since June/July 2007. The Dapper extension is new to release 1.8.3.

Read/Write web has just posted about some awesome new features in Mindtouch’s new release of Deki Wiki, version 1.8.3 (disclosure: I am working with Aaron Fulkerson of Mindtouch on a side project). Deki Wiki is an open source enterprise wiki and can be downloaded and installed behind the firewall. This is a great option for organizations weary of storing their data “in the cloud” as is required by other hosted alternatives.

Version 1.8.3 has some exciting capabilities, namely:

• Support for 9 languages (with two Spanish dialects included)
• Integration to Amazon S3 services for data storage
• Scalability - run 1000s of Deki Wiki instances on a single host
• “Automagic” merge feature when content is edited concurrently
• Easy integration with widgets and apps using Dekiscript and XML descriptors
• Extensions for Dapper and Google services to support the creation of mashups within Deki Wiki pages (this is probably the coolest feature). Extensions are well documented
• Over a dozen new wiki skins

Aaron has put together a video highlighting these new features (check it out here). The most compelling to me is the mashup capability. Dapper is changing the way information is syndicated on the internet, and Deki Wiki has extensions that make it easy to integrate to “dapps” created with Dapper. Data retrieved from dapps can then be fed into Google Charts or Google Maps, for example, to create a rich visual representation of the data.

This could be a game changer in the enterprise wiki market, especially if Mindtouch provides extensions for enterprise mashup makers like Kapow to provide a mashup capability with line of business applications behind the firewall. A partnership there could prove to be very compelling.

I recently had a discussion with Sam Lawrence, Chief Marketing Officer at Jive Software, about his take on social computing in 2008.  I’ve written about Jive several times and have been impressed with Clearspace - Jive’s Enterprise 2.0, social productivity application.  Below is a summary some of the things Sam and I discussed. 

Jive - Company Background

Jive Software was founded 7 years ago and, until recently, was entirely self funded.  In 2007 Jive Software received $15 million in funding from Sequoia Capital (although they’ve been profitable from the beginning) - the same firm that financed the likes of Google, Yahoo!, Youtube and Meebo.  Sam’s take on Sequoia was that they weren’t just bankers, they actually add business value. 

At the beginning of last year, Jive had 35 employees.  Today they have over 100 and anticipate continued growth in 2008.  Sam mentioned that going public isn’t a business goal, but that if they do go public it’ll simply be a “means to an end”.

Jive has over 2,000 business customers, 250 of which have purchased Clearspace. 

The Enterprise 2.0 Market

I asked Sam what his reaction was to Jevon’s post about the Enterprise 2.0 Market, where Jevon asked “Is there such thing as an Enterprise 2.0 market? If so, can you sell in to it? If not: are there startups trying to sell to customers who don’t exist?”  Sam’s take on this is that there absolutely is an Enterprise 2.0 market, how else could they be making money with Clearspace if there was no market?  Sam went on to compare the E2.0 market to the CRM market of 10 years ago, where people argued that customer relationship management couldn’t be generalized.   But try making this argument now with companies like Siebel (Oracle) and they’d probably laugh at you.

Sam also pointed out that Google is a huge player when it comes to Enterprise 2.0.  They’ve recently announced that Google Sites - an evolution of JotSpot - will be released in 2008.  “Sites will allow business to set up intranets, project management tracking, customer extranets, and any number of custom sites based on multi-user collaboration”.  Google’s focus on social computing within the enterprise is validating the Enterprise 2.0 market.  Sam thinks that Enterprise 2.0 vendors like Jive Software will benefit greatly from this as they can ride the tidalwave created by Google.  Companies will become more aware of what Enterprise 2.0 is in 2008.

2008

Jive is a firm believer in social productivity.  When it comes down to it, social computing is about getting work done efficiently.  In 2007 Jive’s focus was on building a compelling collaboration suite.  In 2008, they’ll focus more on enhancing social productivity in the following ways:

• Relevant Visibility - who’s working on what and what matters most
• Influence - encouraging productive behavior and resource alignment by allocating resources where they’re needed most
• Management - knowing the truth of what’s happening and focusing the attention of others

Jive also is a firm believer in harnessing the knowledge of the customer community with products like Clearspace X and will be focusing a lot of attention here in 2008.   

Sam also believes the competition between Jive and traditional IT vendors like IBM and Oracle, “2.0″ pure play vendors and CMS providers will intensify in 2008 as the market gains more traction. 

Clearspace is also often compared to Sharepoint, so I asked Sam what his take on competition with Microsoft was.  Sam argued that Sharepoint, although it has a lot of great features, is more file centric.  Clearspace, on the other hand, is focused around collaboration.  In this way the business driver is different between why one company would buy one product over the other.

In Conclusion

Jive Software will continue its incredible growth in 2008 and will be more widely recognized as a leader in the Enterprise 2.0 space.  I think this growth might also attract larger enterprise players to consider acquiring Jive to gain a stronger foothold in the market.  Keep an eye on Jive in 2008.