A new analysis of the emerging web, or Web 2.0, is flawed but provocative, writes Martin Murphy

Book Review Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everythingby Don Tapscott and Anthony D Williams; Atlantic Books; €19

Tapscott's and Williams's Wikinomics is a provocative attempt to describe how the emerging web, which is widely viewed as the second generation of web-based communities and hosted services, coined Web 2.0, is opening up new business models.

Citing well-known Web 2.0 sites, such as Wikipedia, Flickr and MySpace, they show how the new web is much more interactive and personal, allowing groups to self-organise, aggregate knowledge and attract participation from a wider, more diverse global audience.

Aiming at non-IT executives, the authors describe a new web where mass collaboration is possible like never before.

However, the examples are limited to social networking sites and the book would have been of more value had it translated the potential that these sites exemplify to a business setting.

While overemphasising its basic points, the book achieves its goal to a large degree. Using sound but limited examples, the authors propose that companies take on a number of principles to succeed in the web era. These include:

• Peering: developing products and business through collaborative participation in open-source projects, such as Linux.

• Ideagoras: engage in open idea marketplaces such as InnoCentive, where your company can post their R&D problems to the world.

• Prosumers: provide a means whereby customers can add their own value to your product or service.

• New Alexandrians: the book emphasises the advances made in fighting disease by breaking down proprietary walls and sharing in medical science.

• Platforms for Participation: Amazon is a prominent example of this. If you use a niche bookseller with its own brand, don't be surprised to find out if you are indirectly dealing with Amazon.

These are the authors' principles for success in the web era. Are they fact or fiction? I suggest somewhere in the middle. There's no doubt that Web 2.0 is advancing rapidly and providing advantages, both for business and society. However, many of the concepts outlined in the book are around a long time.

As technology is now pervasive, these concepts may be useful as part of a balanced innovation portfolio.

Wikinomicsdefinitely brings these concepts alive and will provoke interest.

Martin Murphy is managing director of HP Ireland