6/24/2008 -- At its Cisco Live! customer and user confab held this week in Orlando, Cisco trumpeted its new Learning Network, a Web 2.0 community that facilitates collaboration -- document sharing, user forums and other activities -- between and among networking professionals.

Cisco said its burgeoning Cisco Learning Network will help grease the skids, so to speak, for IT pros who wish to transition into working with converged technologies.

"As networks continue to stimulate economic growth, collaboration and human interaction, the need for networking talent will grow in importance," said Jeanne Beliveau-Dunn, general manager of Learning@Cisco, in a statement. "With the...launch of the Cisco Learning Network, we have added [a] critical component to our companywide initiative to address the global IT talent shortage, accelerate the development of the information economy and improve the productivity of this vital technical community."

The Learning Network is full of Web 2.0 amenities like blogs, wikis and forums. Eventually, Cisco suggested, its Learning Network will help shape its ongoing education strategy by providing unfiltered feedback that Cisco can use to help hone its training programs.

Those interested can register and participate in Cisco's new Web site here. Stephen Swoyer