I met with the SharePoint Users Group of Kansas City today. And they brought up an interesting topic.  And all in all it makes sense.  Should IT release SharePoint in the hands of the end users...  I would say yes, but your managers and execs would probably say no.  Like the mindsharp people were saying SharePoint is a tool for their employees to communicate with other employees... and everytime you attempt to increase the communication in the workplace there is hesitation by management.  The oldest MCT in the biz, a mindsharp trainer, was recalling the days when companies were first thinking about placing phones at employees desks...  and then when email was to hit the desktop with Outlook...  Each time a tool becomes available to enhance communication among employees, management wants to have their hands in it, with an attempt to control and police it.  However, like with email and the phone, SharePoint will produce more results when it is placed in the hands of the employees.  Each individual employee having their own mysite, and each dept having its own site with subsites.  There will be a learning curve, but someday it will be an everyday utility.

 There is also another side to SharePoint, a development environment for web based applications.  Also SharePoint can be used as a WUI, web user interface, (Intranet) for various web applications you already have in place, or develop new Web Part centric applications.  Your applications, now housed in SharePoint, will inherit SharePoint's Security model and features.  Bringing together various diverse applications into a concise homogenious format as well as their look, feel, and navigation.