Google has announced its newest push into the social media incursion in the form of Google Buzz. It is a social networking tool which enables the Gmail users to share updates, photos, videos and more. It sounds like an imitation of the features of the most popular Social networking sites Facebook and Twitter.
Gmail is the third most popular Web-based email in the world with 176.5 million users worldwide. Google has fallen behind Facebook, facing a tough competition after Facebook’s acquisition of FriendFeed.
However, privacy concerns have been raised about this new tool too. Buzz compiles a list of the Gmail contacts that users most frequently e-mail or chat with and automatically starts following these people and makes the list public for other buzz users (which probably many of us don’t want). Many people who start using Buzz may be publicly linked to other users without realizing it that the default setting is to make the information public.
Despite Buzz being the major topic of conversation on Twitter in the last 24 hours or so, it doesn’t compare with the excitement garnered by other recent product announcements. Most users have been comparing it to their experience on Twitter and feedback is mixed. Following are some reviews from Twitter users.
· As per the reviews..it seems that the only thing good about Buzz is that its optional.. 😀 Vishupuri
· It’s interesting, I’m not really in to facebook, but I am attracted to buzz because it seems to fit into my work flow #googlebuzz Phil Peterman
· Thinking about Google Buzz this morning. Not sure if its going to be business tool for me or a personal tool. Greg Wilson
It might seem overwhelming and unnecessary when you’re already using so many other social networking services, but Buzz allows you to integrate Picasa, Flickr, Twitter and your Google Reader so you can be as transparent as ever right in one place. And, of course, I’d imagine that the bulk of our sharing takes place while on the go, so there is a mobile version, too.
Mashable is already loaded with Google buzz sharing button and reviews Buzz as a partner for twitter but an attempt to challenge the dominance of Facebook by not importing status updates from Facebook while tweets will be imported.
Google is going to have a difficult time building a user base when everyone who has a Facebook profile (that’s just about everyone who uses the social web at all now) is concerned that they can’t see their friends’ updates. They’ll have to keep using Facebook to stay in touch with their Facebook friends.
And last but not the least here is a video tutorial from Google itself to know what buzz is all about.
[ev type=”youtube” data=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yi50KlsCBio”][/ev]
So are you buzzing?
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