Google goes Social

Google introduced a social networking tool called Google Buzz that allows sharing of status updates, images, and videos via a new Gmail tab called Google Buzz. In other words, a somewhat Facebook version for Google. The Google Buzz features will also be available on Android based phones as well as the iPhone (via a Web-based application) allowing for real-time updates to your Google Buzz feed that can show up on a new version of Google’s mobile maps.

Google says the new Google Buzz tab will begin showing up on about 1 percent of Gmail user accounts starting today. Luckily enough, I was part of that 1 percent ! 

Google hopes that instead of conversing on Facebook, Twitter, or MySpace, you’ll instead turn to Google Buzz for sharing status updates, photos, and videos. Not an easy task, given the fact that these social platforms are incredibly popular well entrenched in the user market. How will the search giant convince you to make Google Buzz your social network of choice? Perhaps the following Buzz features might just do that.

Blends With Gmail

The main way of accessing Google Buzz will be through Gmail. Below your inbox, there will be a tab for Buzz, allowing you to read status updates, photos, and video.

The 40 people you converse with the most in Gmail and Gchat are automatically added as friends. Buzz updates also appear in your inbox if someone comments on your updates or comments, or someone directs a Buzz to your attention by using the familiar “@” symbol.

“Page Rank” for Status Updates

Google brought up that familiar criticism of social networks, that no one cares if you ate a bagel or stubbed your toe.

To compensate for noise, Google Buzz lets you like and dislike status updates, and learn over time whether to show or collapse status updates from your friends. It also looks for conversations outside your direct group of followers and adds them to your feed as recommendations. A very cool feature !

Media Gets Pulled In

Photos from Flickr and Picasa and video from YouTube appear as thumbnails in Google Buzz. Click a YouTube thumbnail, and the video will expand to play inline. Click on a photo, and it’ll expand to fill most of the browser window, with the rest of the gallery in a narrow strip along the bottom of the screen.
If you post a link in Buzz, you’ll automatically be able to append images and the headline from that Web page. Finally, you can pull in tweets from Twitter into Buzz. Not surprisingly it won’t pull in feeds from Facebook. Unfortunately, you can’t send your Buzz updates out to Twitter or other social networks as yet.

Private and Public

With each update you send, you’ll have a choice of making it private or public. Private updates can go to all of your Buzz followers, or just a select group. Public updates are posted on your Google Profile page and are immediately indexed for Google Search. Kudos to Google for addressing the private-public issue upfront with Buzz !

So question is, will I move out of Facebook onto Buzz ? Highly unlikely. But I will certainly not give up playing around with it. Only time will tell.