SiliconBeat writes about a new wiki platform for the masses, Wetpaint. They’re still ahead of the mainstream consumer marketplace, but community and online collaboration tools continue to gain momentum. And because we couldn’t resist this issue (again), we’ve just added a new panel to Drilling Down:

Social Search Is the New Black
Almost every new startup includes a community or "social media" layer. Notwithstanding the success of MySpace (at least in being acquired for lots of money), do these new applications really offer something compelling for the end user or is this just hype and novelty? The Kelsey Group has described social networking/social media as a valuable "online word of mouth" feature that needs to be appended to or integrated into a pre-existing business model. Is "social" really the "future of search" as some have recently argued or merely a fad that will pass in time?