Do You Think Google Buzz Will Be a Success?

Yes.

Scary, isn't it?!?!

I think it might surprise people by becoming a success rather quickly. The reason is the sheer number of people on a Google client at any time. From the comment from my 24 year old daughter as to why she is chatting on Google with her friends rather than on Faceboook is that "it's too public". Seems like FaceBook and twitter may be jumping the shark as we speak! Google Buzz may be the new cool, exclusive thing to be in!

The buzz about Buzz is annoying. But, they have a base of 150 million+ gmail users that can easily pick up on it. And it seems to be the same as Twitter without the 140-character limit. Which may be annoying too -- it was refreshing having everyone keep their messages bare-bones concise.

Success is all about adoption. And you shouldn't underestimate the barrier to adoption of multiple logons/apps.

Once you are in Google apps (Docs, Gmail) it is easy to use Buzz. And with more and more corporates moving from MSExchange to GMail the appeal of Buzz can only grow.

However, Google need to make it easier to migrate users from Twitter and our favourite Twitter apps need to support Buzz..

Finally, I agree that the discipline of 140 ch and URL compression makes Twitter compelling. Buzz has the potential to just be another InBox full of longwinded comment.

I think it may be a success because Buzz is essentially is being pushed on all Gmail users. But where I worry is that the information overload which we already deal with will get multiplied by content from people you follow. There is no filtering mechanism that I can see as yet. So if the alternative is to just shut it off, then Buzz fails. More on my reaction in my post at http://www.softwareindustryinsights.com/2010/02/google-buzz-kill/

The hype we saw around Google Wave was drammatic - and months after it emerged, the results are even more drammatic - for being exactly the opposite of what everyone expected! Wave may not have really taken off or become compelling enough, but Google Buzz is likely to see much higher sustained interest.

While it may not immediately erode the Twitter user base, it will certainly push a lot of people not on Twitter yet to engage with a network of friends and indulge in Twitter-like conversations.

I'd say Buzz will drammatically increase the base of users actively engaging in Social Media.

The whole story will get much more exciting - thats for sure!

Not an unqualified success, no. Buzz faces a couple of significant problems:

• While the built-in user base (37 million, at last report) would seem to guarantee success, gMailers may not adopt for several reasons:
  1. They are already heavily invested in either Facebook or Twitter, gMail is not their primary account, and they and don't see enough added value in Buzz - when either or both of those services can be auto-piped into Buzz, and they may never visit the native interface;
  2. They consider Buzz's integration into their email flow a disruption
  3. They don't care about social media to begin with.
• Those who don't have any of these objections will almost certainly have a serious objection to Buzz's significant privacy issues.
  
  Worst of these is the complete lack of filtration on initial load of your friends. Bottom line, Google lets anyone using Buzz who happens to be in your inbox see what you're posting.

Google is the smartest 1,000-pound gorilla in this space, but if they launch a product with so significant a flaw, they've already lost hundreds of thousands of potential users. Burned once, they won't return.

To put a finer point on it, the security issue has violated Google's vaunted "do no evil" brand-stance - and killed the Buzz in the eyes of plenty of users.

And it's only been - what - three days?

This is one of those areas where the way I like to work and what a the majority of people want conflict. I like a complete separation of concerns. When I do email, I want to read my email and not a hundred other points of data. Hence, I never connected any RSS feeds into my email either. I use Twitter to see what's happening in the various topic circles that I'm interested in and I use Facebook when, as my 16-year old daughter likes to say, "I'm in a stalking mood". When it all comes at you from one client, it's practically overwhelming. And, yet, it seems that majority of people want this type of convergence.

However, like Wave, I see this is as an experiment more than a permanent direction. Indeed, a social experiment about the way people work and interact. I believe, it's less about being successful with either Buzz or Wave and more about building the next generation of eyeballs to sell advertising to.

Google buzz surely could have cut into the blog's share, but alas Google made many blunders with this product. I think Google Buzz leaves a lot to be desired. Some of the very basic features are missing from this product. Google who have been champions of Privacy have failed miserably in Google buzz.

Read this for all the security and privacy concerns about Google buzz:
http://securenw.blogspot.com/2010/02/google-buzz-security-and-privacy.html