Steve Wylie had a great post last week on the downsides of social networking.  I had the opportunity to give a presentation yesterday on Web 2.0 to a large group of end-users in Chicago.  During the presentation I discussed many of the opportunities and challenges of Web 2.0, both from an internal and external perspective.  At the end we opened the session up to audience Q&A and interestingly enough, many of the audience questions focused on the topics raised in Steve's post. 

Attendees wanted to know how they could ensure that public Web 2.0 efforts such as blogs and wikis weren't abused by rogue users.  They wanted to understand what the risks were in opening comment forms up, and even if it wasn't someone trying to sell Viagra, what if someone posted something that attacked the sponsor of the blog.  How would they respond?  Was it worth the risk?

I think Steve, and the subsequent commenter raised some interesting points, we need to consider downsides as we move into a more open communications environment.  Still, I think the rewards outweigh the risks.