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Confluence is commercial intranet software produced by Attlassian. It comes in both hosted or dowload options. It is an enterprise Wiki suited to larger organisations as it allows teams to collaborate and manage knowledge. It provide a single place where people can create, share, comment and edit content together. It comes with source code so it can be integrated with the organisations existing systems and processes.[1] [4] Reportedly it is in use in over 8,100 organisations in 94 countries around the globe across government, education and technology sectors. There is a catalogue of over 100 plug-ins available. The plug-in architecture allows organisations to develop their own.[4] Spaces are created for teams and individuals and permission access secures these spaces. It appears to balance user-friendliness, functionality, scalability and security [3] In using this wiki software as a project management tool users report that it feels polished and professional and is a notch above other offerings like Basecamp or MediaWiki (the platform that powers Wikipedia)[2] [3]. Descriptions like "more robust" and a "real workplace tool' [3], "world's most popular" [4] and the evidence that this product enjoys an active open source community creating plug-ins for all to use, signifies its value in the workplace.[3]

The exchange of information easily and freely in modern business would have to be considered necessary to survive. As stated by Happel (2009) "Exchanging information is vital for the success of modern organizations." Confluence by Atlassian provides a Wiki type service for business that allows the exchange of information. One of Confluences strengths is that it can be adapted and integrated into an organizations system to ensure productive process. Confluence has been adapted and used for collaborative group projects. Some of the reasoning for this is as follows: The Australian Research Council's Network for Early European Research (NEER) uses confluence for interaction with its digital base repository PioNEER. Burrows (2008) states that "Confluence is marketed as 'enterprise Wiki' software, which simply means Wiki-type software with various additional features, including the ability to control access to specific spaces and pages." And that a key element in the process of designing new structure is interoperability between Confluence and PioNEER. Networking Computing's, Anderson (2006) states that "Our Editor's Choice, Atlassian Software Systems' Confluence 2.1.2, has all the features that suit an enterprise wiki. It's easy to install and set up, yet flexible and extensible." Infoworld ranked Confluence highest out of four Wiki Collaboration tools compared and Heck, 2007 stated "It doesn't go overboard with extraneous features, yet still stuffs in an amazing amount of functionality - all surrounded by a good-looking, friendly interface." As a business collaboration and knowledge management tool Confluence offers a wide range of flexibility at competitive pricing.

References Enterprise Collaboration and Wiki Software - Confluence . (n.d.). Atlassian - Software Development Tools and Collaboration Software . Retrieved April 15, 2010, from http://www.atlassian.com/software/confluence/ Anderson, R. (2006, March 30). Review: Wikis In The Enterprise - Network Computing. Network Computing. Retrieved April 15, 2010, from http://www.networkcomputing.com/unified-communications-voip/review-wikis-in-the-enterprise.php?p=5 Burrows, T. (2008). DEVELOPING A DIGITAL REPOSITORY FOR A HUMANITIES RESEARCH NETWORK: THE PIONEER PROJECT. New Review of Academic Librarianship, 13(1), 1-11. Happel, H. (2009). Social search and need-driven knowledge sharing in Wikis with Woogle. International Symposium on Wikis, 13. Retrieved April 15, 2010, from the Acm Portal database. Heck, M. (2007, January 5). Wikis evolve as collaboration tools | Applications - InfoWorld. Business technology, IT news, product reviews and enterprise IT strategies - InfoWorld. Retrieved April 15, 2010, from http://www.infoworld.com/t/applications/wikis-evolve-collaboration-tools-644

Although a blog would not normally be considered as an online collaborative tool, Posterous have developed a front-end engine which makes it very simple and easy for multiple contributors to post to a single blog just by emailing their content to a single email address. Contributors are not required to register as members and the service is free. [1] [2] The subject of the email becomes the title of the post, and the body and attachments of the email become the content of the post. You can post text, photos, music, video, documents and all kinds of files, just by attaching them to the email. Posterous formats it all nicely for you creating picture galleries for multiple images, drops music into mp3 players, video into a flash player and attaches download links for documents. It even resizes large file sizes to make them more web friendly. [1] What sets Posterous apart is its ease of use by allowing contributors to just email their contributions. This opens up the collaboration process to less technically savvy users in a non threatening way. It also does not restrict the size of the posts so they can be as brief or as lengthy as necessary or desired. Setting it up is also quick and simple. As blog owner, you can attach a security password to the blog and nominate the contributors that will take part. Each contributor is invited to post and is notified by email when anyone else has posted something. It makes blogging as easy as email. And by providing access to multiple users in such a simple way, it becomes a central repository for ideas, images, audio, video, stories which is accessible by all. [3]

[1] Administrator. (2006). Confluence. ITerating.com All software reviews and ratings Retrieved 14 April 2010, from http://www.iterating.com/component/content/article/385-wiki-engines/15924-confluence- [2]Attlassian. (2010). Confluence. Everyone on the same page Retrieved 14 April, 2010, from http://www.atlassian.com/software/confluence/tour/enterprise-wiki.jsp [3]Bailey, C. (2006). Confluence Vs Basecamp. Code Intensity Retrieved 14 April, 2010, from http://codeintensity.blogspot.com/2006/08/confluence-vs-basecamp.html [4]Yehuda, G. (2009). Confluence 3.0 = Enterprise Wiki +++. Gil Yehuda's Enterprise 2.0 Blog Retrieved 14 April, 2010, from http://www.gilyehuda.com/2009/06/02/confluence-30-enterprise-wiki/

Posterous is a blogging tool that allows groups to create a shared publishing environment that can easily be accessed via email to share text, photos, audio and video. This removes a major technology challenge from group dynamics, as any file type can be sent to Posterous via email and will automatically be converted to the most web efficient format, for uniform presentation and removing the technology hurdle from user experience [1]. Posterous allows users to log onto the system and then send an email, the text of which is posted attractively to a blog, and if an attachment is included (image or document), that is also posted; these postings can be mirrored automatically to Blogger, where they can be tagged 'writingmatrix' along with other identifiers [2]. [1] Hacker News, "Why I chose Posterous" http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=304102 [2] Stevens, V. "Engaging Collaborative Writing through Social Networking" Foundation Computing, Petroleum Institute, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates Available from: http://www.j-let.org/~wcf/proceedings/d-052.pdf