It’s not too often that a new service from Google goes over poorly, but Google’s new Buzz is generating a fair amount of bad buzz from the get-go. Mike Elgan of Datamation explains his objections.
There’s something wrong with Google Buzz. And it’s the same thing that’s wrong with Google itself. Google is all brains and no heart. All logic and no intuition. Google Buzz should be wonderful. It makes perfect sense. So why does it annoy?
Google Buzz is a connected set of social features that spans multiple services. Buzz brings Twitter-like “tweets” or Facebook-like “status updates” right into Gmail. It enables the sharing of content from photo services and YouTube, and hooks into Google’s “Profiles” service. Buzz is a “layer” in Google Maps. It’s everywhere, and it’s nowhere.
Google Buzz cannot be explained in a single sentence. But once you do explain it, the service sounds pretty darn cool.
Google Buzz is too “open.” Yeah, I said it. But at the same time, it’s not open enough where it really counts. Let me explain.