What’s all The Google Buzz About?
As per usual, once Google releases anything new the hype factor surges to record levels. Pardon my sarcasm here, but it’s true. Don’t get me wrong, I have come to love and appreciate several of their web based applications and services such as Analytics, Docs, Feedburner, Insights, Reader, and Webmaster Tools, but Google has been proselytizing the technology consumer since 1998. For the most part they have been successful aligning themselves with both newbies and web geeks. Where did Webcrawler and Netscape go? AOL can you hear me?
Now Google is looking to expand their growing web 2.0 empire, and the question I have is how is Google Buzz any better than Twitter or Facebook? What does Google Buzz have that Friendfeed lacks? The answer right now is nothing, except Gmail integration.
Google’s strategy is fairly simple: consolidate everything that most computer users access on the web into one central hub. They are looking to become the Walmart of the web, an Internet superstore of sorts.
Today’s growing number of social networks and web 2.0 applications with little practical use and originality reminds me of Mike Judge’s film Idiocracy, in which Luke Wilson portrays Private Joe Bauers, the definition of “average American”, selected by the Pentagon to be the guinea pig for a top-secret hibernation program. Forgotten, he awakes 500 years in the future only to discover a society so incredibly dumbed-down that he’s easily the most intelligent person alive.
When we look at innovation we must consider the intended use and whether or not it will be an enhancement or a distraction. Unless Google Buzz ties into other applications like Analytics and Feedburner to more effectively streamline a social media campaign from start to finish, it will have little room to compete with Facebook and Twitter. Even still, is there really any more room another social network?
Feel free to tell us what you think.
Related Articles
Review: The full buzz on Google Buzz (Computerworld)
Google’s New Buzz: Not Exactly Light Years Ahead (TechNewsWorld)
Is Google Buzz The Twitter Terminator? (Jeff Bullas)
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