While Google has long held the top search engine spot and is huge in advertising and marketing, it has never been able to break into social networking in a meaningful way. That is all going to change with the advent of Google Buzz.
What is Google Buzz?
Google is adding social feature to their products to create common tools for building social applications. The company believes it can help users sort through the massive amounts of information they face each day to find meaningful conversations. Recent additions to the Google lineup include real-time searching and Social Search.
Google envisions Google Buzz as a completely open software platform. The company is sharing information with developers and asking them to join Google and creating code for the project. With the help of developers, there is a good chance Google can eke out a niche in the social networking landscape.
Innovations of Google Buzz
One of the differences in Google Buzz is that it is built into Gmail (Google’s email application). Similar to other social networking applications, Google Buzz allows users to follow their friends online, and it allows users to integrate photos, videos, and Internet links. By the time Google Buzz was announced, Picasa, Flickr, Youtube, Blogger, and Twitter were already fully integrated into it.
One of the innovations of Google Buzz on smart phones is that it takes GPS information from the cell phone and uses it to tag information with where you were when you shared the information. The information is carried through a “Buzz Layer” in Google Maps. Your followers will know who you are, what you know, and where you are.
A Potential Issue
This leads us to perhaps the one potential problem for Google in rolling out the new system. Some people worry about privacy. Google faced this criticism when they enabled Google Reader to automatically send friends information that users wanted to keep private. Google seems to understand that this concern exists and has created a web page to address the concern.
The factor that might determine whether Google Buzz is the next big idea or the next big flop is if users can control their information at a granular level. Although we are going through a social information revolution, there are still individuals who choose privacy over connectivity.
About the Author:
Calvin Bacon is the Director of Creative Services at Wisepreneur.com. His areas of interest include idea generation and innovation management.
Hi Calvin,
I think that people want to have one web site for one thing !
Facebook for social networking “with friends & family”, LinkedIn for social networking “with profesional partners”, Google (or Yahoo) for searching on internet, a web site to lesson musics, and another to the watch movies (Youtube and Daylimotion) .. ect.
I guess the reason of this way of using internet is due to the fear losing our intimacy. People love the internet but they are also scared by its power, and people know how Google is clever to collect personal information through Gmail !
I wish good luck to Google buzz, but I don’t think it will be a big success.
Sincerley,
Ari
Ari,
Google Buzz has actually been out since the end of February. It is interesting to me that Google Buzz has had very little buzz about it. One has to wonder if this means people don’t want their social networks connected? Is it a result of privacy concerns? Or is it just because people have enough social networking sites already? We can post to Facebook; we can Tweet and Retweet, but for most folks, sooner or later you have to get back to work (unless your job is social networking).
Reading the comment about Google Buzz being out since February to means that its almost a flop already, where was the advertising and agressive marketing to get the word out? Its now almost August and this is the first time I’m hearing about this. I believe that people are more for facebook and twitter for social networking and anything new is going to have a hard time breaking in.