Google Knol; Knowledge Management gets Social

According to Irwin Lazar, Principal Research Analyst and Program Director, Nemertes, as of July 31st, Google launched "Knol", "a public knowledge repository providing an alternative to Wikipedia", as described below.

Interestingly, Nemertes also points out that an extraordinary number of IT execs participating in their benchmarking report are evaluating social media point solutions (wikis, blogs), as well as knowledge management systems. This makes sense.

"Part wiki, part blog, and part social computing network, Knol is based on publishing author information, while allowing users to rate the quality of the work. While Knol is a public service, it's not hard to imagine how Knol's framework could be applied to enterprise knowledge management needs...

Web 2.0 knowledge management represents an emerging market space. Look for opportunities to deliver innovative products or integrate with products such as Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) SharePoint and IBM (NYSE:IBM)Lotus Quickr...

Keep your eye on smaller, innovative privately held companies such as HiveLive, Jive Software and Movable Type..."

My question is, to what extent are companies looking at putting PEOPLE (social networking and connectivity, the "who knows what") at the center of the user experience when it comes to FINDING valuable information that has be collaboratively developed and stored? 

My philosophy: facilitate connections, then facilitate knowledge management and communications activities among connected groups.