I'm not sure how new this stuff is, but it's new to me. Tantek Çelik and others held a panel discussion at SXSW entitled "Microformats: Evolving the Web". Early in the discussion Tantek referenced a recent blog entry by Ray Ozzie and a set of Screen casts about Wiring the web and the Web clipboard, all of which are based on microformats.

Two of the principal formats in use today are hCalendar and hCard based on iCal and vCard standards. The screen show the kinds of use you can expect to see in the coming few years as the technologies gain traction. Seems like good stuff for organizations that manage contacts and events eh?

If you really want to take a walk on the wild side, check out flock. These guys are building a browser that recognizes microformats on pages and collects them like cookies that can be indexed for ready search access. Wave of the future? Who knows....