A recent article on the Financial Times about a lack of skills and experience within the web advertsiment sector got me thinking about how the challenge is part of a wider picture in 2.0.

In a nutshell there seems to be a gap between 2.0 "real-time" and the sources of information that are meant to provide relevant players with the needed information and insights, if these are delayed then ultimately so is the development of skills and experience. I have been tracking data for a while, and noticed a widening gap as the information deepens. I believe the trend is integral to the very nature of the source and "information providers":

• Everyday information: 2.0 news within newspapers is printed with a couple of days delay to when it first appears (for example) in the blogosphere. At times, more than a couple of days in non-English language press. Example: Info on Amazon's UnBox appeared in blogs about a week ago and I first saw mention in a British paper yesterday. Similar gaps are common around Google product launches, even greater when it comes to smaller companies (MySpace before being bought by News Corp. would be considered a smaller company in this context...);
• Opinion pieces: Assessments and opinions within magazines and print media appear after weeks and months from when such trends are first covered in specialized media or in the blogosphere i.e. are relevant. Examples: recent articles on corporate blogging and on blogging as relevant to new business models for the publishing (both on FT last week) and the piece on the Economist on the Internet killing (and potentially saving) the newspaper. Such trends are covered as emerging, while they are actually yesterdays headlines. Consequence: the trends are not emerging and actually evolved rapidly; relevant players base their assessments on delayed opinions; players who only trust mainstream observations lag behind and do not understand change or embrace change painfully slowly losing relevance; a first motif behind a general lack of innovation;
• Consulting: Large and generic consulting firms produce analysis and research that is often months old. Examples: The Mckinsey Quarterly (which has brilliant pieces on other sectors) has just published a book entitled "Profiting from Proliferation", basically The Long Tail. Consequence: large firms that depend on such insights are provided (purchase at massive fees) research that is not cutting edge i.e. neither are strategies and decisions that leverage on such research ; companies do not embrace change effectively and lose relevance; mainstream enterprise opinion neither and thus is also not cutting-edge; a second motif behind a lack of innovation;
• Academia: Media Studies courses in most Universities (my analysis is based on the UK and Italy, but I am assuming, with exceptions, that the case is global) are based on theories, biblography and resources that are several years old. Example: a Political Economy of Mass Media course would be based on transnational media corporations, vertical and horizontal integration, global conglomerates and mainly focus on traditional media formats with the web as an emerging reality as the core framework/context. Consequence: an out of date picture; irrelevant challenges and solutions are explored and debated; research is not cutting-edge; insights mainly on the past; a large portion of undergraduates don't develop relevant skills/insight/understanding; a third motif behind a lack of innovation.

Obviously there are exceptions (and for obvious reasons I cannot publish all the data), yet an abundant trend is evident and can be defined as a 2.0 innovation gap that is embedded in information/knowledge industries, that this gap trickles down from profund academic research and consulting to maistream opinion and news, simultaneously widening and tightening, and it eventually leads to a mainstream (a.k.a. the rotting core) lack of skill in web related sectors (such as online advertising) and insight from an individual angle and a is also relevant to a senile understanding of change, cutting-edge, context and innovation from an enterprise perspective.