Google Buzz: Is it worth all the hype?
Tuesday, February 23, 2010 at 12:38 PM 
Will Google Buzz be a contender in the social media arena?Admittedly, it is with some trepidation that I slide into the world of Google Buzz. Why? I don't really know. At the moment, I have a pretty full social networking arsenal at my disposal. I have a LinkedIn account which I am looking at breathing new life into. I use Facebook and Twitter religiously. And lastly, I have my own personal space courtesy of this blog.
The last thing I want to do is join another social networking space...but I'm willing to make an exception here. I took a few moments out of my day to sign up and enable Buzz in my personal Gmail account along with a quick update of my profile. I fired up Mobile Safari on my iPhone 3GS and added http://buzz.google.com as a link off my home screen...Now what?
I don't really know. Hopefully, the next few weeks may shed some insight into how I can really begin to leverage Buzz to its fullest potential.
In the interim, why not check out the following links for some more information
- "What is Google Buzz?" - http://gizmodo.com/5467846/what-is-google-buzz
- "Google Buzz for mobile" - http://www.google.com/mobile/buzz/ - This is a nice comparison to see how this may be used on the iPhone, Android, or your smartphone of choice
- "Hide/Remove Google Buzz Updates from Your Gmail Inbox" - http://lifehacker.com/5468067/hideremove-google-buzz-updates-from-your-gmail-inbox
What do you think? Is Google Buzz going to be a contender - or just another social networking also-ran similar to MySpace?
Rob Brennan
I was expecting Google Buzz to seamlessly integrate with my Twitter account and was sadly disappointed. I followed the appropriate steps to add my account and much to my surprise it brought in one tweet. OK...Odd, but I could live with that. So far so good...or at least, so I thought.
Six (6) tweets - and forty-four (44) minutes later - I checked back into Google Buzz. Much to my surprise, none of my recent tweets loaded. I clicked refresh...and waited. Nothing. I clicked refresh several more times...and waited. Nothing. I removed my Twitter account association and re-added it...and waited. Nothing. Apparently, refreshing does not actually refresh associated accounts - only Google Buzz itself? Odd.
As it turns out, this is a known issue according to Google's Gmail Help. According to Google:
Buzz crawls Twitter on a regular basis and we are still tuning that cycle length. This can result in your tweets showing up in batches in Buzz rather than in real time.
Really? So nearly three quarters of an hour later, Buzz still has no idea I have recent tweets? Major fail, Google. This is supposed to be the next big thing in social networking? I doubt it. One of the key benefits of social networking is the real-time stream. Useful integration would require living up to this standard of timeliness.
Strike one.
Rob Brennan
The Google Buzz integration with Twitter is completely lame. I am now seeing my tweets show up; however it is well after the fact. I fired off a bunch of tweet's during last night's SUNYAC semifinal hockey game between Plattsburgh and Brockport (~7pm-9pm EST). As expected, they hit Twitter and Facebook right on cue and in a timely manner...but when did Google Buzz finally bring them into my feed? Would you believe 5:06am EST today? Major FAIL.
Rob Brennan
After exploring Google Buzz over the past month, I still cannot help but feel this product is hardly ready to be taken seriously. It's slow. It's ugly. It's not very intuitive, and it offers little reason to check in and use it throughout the day. I think it's safe to say that this product is dead on arrival unless radical changes are made.