Socialtext increases SharePoint integration

Socialtext announced a major upgrade to its SocialPoint SharePoint integration tool providing a way to insert SharePoint social activity into the Socialtext activity stream. The upgrade incorporates the recently released Socialtext Connect tool into SocialPoint to increase integration between the two tools. As more companies use SharePoint, pure social tools like Socialtext need to find a way to integrate the two to remain relevant.

These tools provide a way for Socialtext to sell itself as what Socialtext president Eugene Lee calls the "social layer in the enterprise." They hope that companies will continue to rely on Socialtext, a mature Enterprise 2.0 platform, even while they continue to use SharePoint for its other functions such as content management.

It's worth noting that Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) had a presence at the recent Enterprise 2.0 Conference, specifically to trumpet its social tools. As I wrote in "SharePoint's Finn relaxed and confident," "Finn said Microsoft continues to have a significant presence at Enterprise 2.0 because he believes not enough people are aware of the social functions within SharePoint."

With Socialtext Connect, SharePoint users can publish events from SharePoint directly into Socialtext including when they create or update a file, check files in or out of SharePoint or update a document library. Since many companies use SharePoint as their main document repository, using Socialtext provides a way to collaborate and share information seamlessly between the two tools and should help facilitate collaboration.

For more information:
- see the Socialtext press release

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