In the same week 3 people who I respect and listen to on different sides when it comes to considering the future.

First Tim Beadle of Marketing Improvement says as one of his forecast for 2008 that...

Web 2.0, or the semantic web or the user-generated content web (choose your favourite term) will be quietly dropped as businesses and consumers recognize the inherent risks of a) linking web systems together and b) telling the whole world about yourself. If Web 2.0 becomes anything, it will become the home of web applications that will work well on a mobile phone. As more and more phones adopt the format of the iphone, why would you need a big, heavy laptop or clunky PDA?

This is in the same week that both General Motors and Coca Cola announcement even greater support for user generated media and social media conversations rather than traditional marketing.

In the same week the head of Intel talks about the 'personal and portable web'. Tim is wrong on the first count. User generated content is here to stay. I do agree with him on the second point. Smart mobiles with customised applications merging the functionailty of PDAs and laptops with location specific filtered information will be available in the next 5 years. I cannot wait for my smart phone to start delivering specific information based upon my Facebook profile and other information when I arrive in a country. Give me some maps. Locations of places to eat based upon known availability (and if reservations are needed) and filtered to reflect other peoples recommendations. The recommendors profiles will be matched and ranked against my profile so giving me more confidence to trust their judgement. To me that is where the real value of social networking lies. Using their generated inputed of experiences and recommendations to influence my decisions.

Now check out what Jeff Jarvis says in his latest blog about journalist training and them having their own personal blogs. Also see what David Brain, CEO of Edelman Europe says about candidates having social media awareness and experience.