Internet - the sequel

Interactive services available through the internet, such as blogs, instant messaging, wikis or podcasts, are often considered to be little more than popular time-killers for web-hooked teenagers, but the most IT savvy entrepreneurs believe these 'Web 2.0' services will soon cement their position in the world of business.

Profits are very often not the main motivating factor for Web 2.0 services - Wikipedia is currently used and edited by around 15 million people worldwide, and survives on donations. However, Web 2.0 sites that need a healthy cold, hard bottom line to survive are competing with traditional portals and websites for the same revenue streams from advertisers and/or subscribers.

Polish Web 2.0 services very often draw on their English-language counterparts. For example the instant messengers Gadu-gadu and Tlen are Polish versions of ICQ.

"The young generation has been growing up with internet access at home. Reading web content is not enough for them - they want to create it themselves," Michał Kowalik, an analyst at Intel, told a TMT seminar on Web 2.0 in Poland. "They communicate and network via the internet and in the future they will want to use all accessible tools at work."

According to Bogdan Wiśniewski, an associate partner at the MCI Management fund, Web 2.0 will develop to serve business purposes. He says companies could use wikis to facilitate teamwork and corporate blogs to enhance their PR strategy, as was the case with a blog written by Microsoft's former employee Robert Scoble.

"Scoble's blog has done more good to Microsoft's image than millions spent on traditional strategies - it showed the giant's human face," Wiśniewski added.