Web 2.0 Summit
I especially enjoyed listening to Tim O'Reilly talking to Paul Maritz (VMware, Inc.) and others about cloud computing. Maritz makes the point that we are moving away from a device centric world to an information centric world. This is something we already intuitively know actively assume in our dealings with our data and information. Maritz also points out that putting our information in the cloud (in any way, even by typing a term into a search box) is taking part in an information marketplace. We are giving away some of our privacy and some personal information about ourselves in order that we get some benefit in return (e.g. an answer to our query). On a larger scale, an organization putting its information in the cloud--into that marketplace--and allowing others to add value to it through things like mashups or user tagging can make our information more valuable--to others but also to us.
