Anyone else remember when "The Nando Times" was the first (and only) "real" newspaper web site? (It took me a long time to realize that "Nando" was short for "News and Observer"--the newspaper in Charlotte, North Carolina. Yeah, I know. Duh.)

The News and Observer still has a thriving presence on the web, and today a friend who lives there sent me this link to an article on social software written by reporter Paul Gilster. (Thanks, Tom!)

Apparently, Gilster attended ETCon. After listening to the speakers, reading the real-time blog coverage of the event, and checking out the conference wiki pages, he had this to say:

I suppose a Wiki is social software if I choose to call it that. But I'm not sure the "social" designation is useful. Isn't e-mail "social?" And how about a newsgroup, or a mailing list? Almost any network tool is in some way social simply because it plugs into a global network.

So, what does make software "social"? The topic came up recently on the SSA mailing list...but before any real answers emerged, the discussion was drowned out by those who felt that it got in the way of the important coding still to be done. There's still a lot of room in that space for discussion. Matt Webb has taken a stab at it recently, and points to several other useful sits. Meatball Wiki has a nice page with definitions and links. But there's not been the kind of consensus that would be nice to see given the growing use of the term.