In summary, social software should be:
Smarter
- XML/RDF/RSS syndication technologies
- Distributed, collaborative metadata
- Ontology development and the Semantic Web
- Adaptive design and context-awareness
Simpler
- Smaller, modular software with common methods and properties
- Web services and shared protocols
- Usability and ‘unfinished’ user experience design
- Shared and open source code
Social
- In the way it is conceived: stakeholder engagement, inclusive process
- In the way it is built: collaborative development, partnership
- In what it does: augments social networking; weblogs, wikis, messaging, etc.
- In how it works: adaptive qualities, personalisation, agent technologies, etc.