IBM enters social networking space

BANGALORE: IBM today announced two new programs that help organizations and information technology professionals engage in online collaborative networks. The new programs are designed to help developers and business partners uncover the value of social networking to collaborate, generate news ideas and advance business opportunities.

For its 5.8 million members, IBM launched IBM developerWorks community spaces, a new resource that allows developers to tap into a global network, to build communities around a broad range of technology topics and business trends including software as a service, service-oriented architecture (SOA) and mashups.

Another program, IBM Lotus Connections for Partners allows IBM business partners to create and share profile information that describes their business, find subject matter experts, share online information through social book marking and blogging, as appropriate, engage in collaborative business activities and join communities of interest.

"With today's news our goal is to further enhance the concept of building successful communities around key technology areas within the enterprise,” said Jim Corgel, general manager, ISV and developer relations, IBM. “These new initiatives are providing our business partners and developers with the resources they need to deliver innovative offerings to the marketplace."

According to industry analyst firm Forrester Research, social software tools will become so much a part of the fabric of an enterprise's collaborative environment that it will be like air -- enterprises won't be able to imagine life without it. Further, according to Forrester, the demand for social software tools is growing with usage rates of social software services almost doubling between 2005 and 2006.

“IBM continues to play a significant role in driving the adoption of new business models,” said Ken Wasch, president, Software Information Industry Association (SIIA). “These new communities create a unique network for developers, business partners and IT professionals to come together and share group intelligence. IBM and SIIA are working together to enable innovation and drive market changes around key industry trends.”

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