A very clean perspective, rather a practical one! Thanks much for sharing all the thoughts and in a concise way. Simple tools and techniques is what we need to allow users to collaborate and effectively. Creating an environment, I liked the cafeteria part especially :) There are many such good examples of simple and effective tools which almost allows easy and effective collaboration withing users having even noticed that it is happening. I am an educationalist and have effectively used a great example http://www.funnelbrain.com that suits this write up, a good collaborative learning tool.