Tech | February 10, 2010 | 21 comments

Google Buzz: What's Wrong, & How to Fix It

I finally enabled Google Buzz today and have spent the morning futzing around with it, sending out a few buzzes, uploading some stuff, customizing behaviors, and observing how people are interacting so far. My first impression? Buzz is fantastic in theory, but not yet ready for prime time.

Some initial thoughts/questions:

- Auto-following based on who I've been emailing/chatting with recently is unnatural and bound to both confuse and anger people. For example, my landlord uses Gmail and I was auto-following her right off the bat, even though all we ever email about is how late my rent is. I understand that Google's trying to be helpful here, but it just seems like a recipe for disaster.

- Why do my buzz comments propagate in real-time within Gmail, but not from my Google profile?

- I agree with Kevin Rose's opinion that "google.com/profiles/sarahlane" is unnecessarily long, and that I should be able to point "google.com/sarahlane" to my profile (Facebook did it, so I assume Google could at least consider it). Also, /profiles/ is unintuitive, but /profile/ produces a 404 error. Think of how many people will get that wrong.

- I love having the option to auto-post my Flickr photos and view the photo in-line in Buzz, but my Flickr description gets left out. Often times my subject and description are meant to be read together (what can I say... I'm a nerd)

- Can the RSS feed associated with my Buzz page stay static by timestamp of buzz, with most recent at the top? Right now whatever buzz has the most recent comment pushes that buzz to the top, no matter how old it is. Or is this a FriendFeed-type feature I should be embracing?

A couple useful tips/fixes I've discovered so far:

- Want to filter your buzzes out of your inbox? Lifehacker posted an easy fix that I set up in about 30 seconds and highly recommend:

  1. In Gmail, create a new filter
  2. In the "has the words" text box, enter "label:buzz" (Gmail may warn you that this won't work, but just say ok)
  3. Check the box "skip the inbox" and click "add filter". (I also applied the label "sarahlane buzz" so that my buzzes would still be visible to me, rather than just archived)

- Want to send your buzzes to Twitter (by default, this is not yet possible)? This workaround isn't perfect, but it works:

  1. If you don't have one already, create an account at twitterfeed (other services like ping.fm and RSS2Twitter will work in similar ways)
  2.  Set up a new feed: http://buzz.googleapis.com/feeds/(user)/public/posted but replace "(user)" with your actual username
  3. Under advanced settings, set to post description only (I also appended "Buzz:" to appear before the content itself so that it's obvious when it hits Twitter, but that's optional).

What does everyone else think of Google Buzz so far? I'm all ears.

  1. groups:
    Tech,   Technology,   WebCrawler,   Tech 2
  2. tags:
    Tech,  Google,  Twitter,  Community,  8 more
  3.     
    |

21 comments // Google Buzz: What's Wrong, & How to Fix It

  • jcstone3
  • TGUP
  • mojojuju
    • 0
      mojojuju  

    • It seems like every three weeks Google releases "the next big thing" that's supposed to revolutionize how we use the web.

    • 1 year ago
  • nocturnus9
    • 0
      nocturnus9  

    • I am looking forward to what this becomes. I am noticing a trend where Google will make things live with the forethought that it needs to be in the wild before it is polished. That the community that adopts it will develop guiding rules and what is wonderful. This early adopter community will self police and we (Google) will not have to invest as much energy into supporting the community (Think: "Customer Support" for Android/Nexus One).

      I can see a lot of value in Google buzz in connecting with my Triathlon & Master Swim team by logistically supporting travel to races. In the short term I imagine I will be using my rules from e-mail and moderating blog comments, but there are some rules we will make up along the way. I see the potential to not automatically follow people on buzz because there is the potential attack vector for illicit marketers.

      I have a detailed profile on Blogger. I do not think Buzz has made the effort to look at what I tagged as Interests, Movies, Music & Books. I am more likely to follow someone that comes close to overlapping my interests based on the metadata that I have provided there. I can see the bloggers that meet one tag there. When will the Buzz algorithm scan that data and make suggestions based on common interests (digital venn diagrams gone wild)?

      Last night on Tummelvision #6, there was an insightful discussion on social interaction design with Adrian Chan. I agree with the problem is that the Buzz fire-hose what the focus to this point but Google is expecting the community will develop the skills that define the Buzz life on the fly.

      http://tummelvision.tv/

      Years from now when we are using our Buzz-Skills in Google Wave (that thing they said would replace e-mail) it will all be fun.

    • 1 year ago
  • eva2
  • Danny
  • UWAZell
    • +3
      UWAZell  

    • I'm of the opinion that Google [G] is the equivalent of a company with ADD. That is to say that the start projects, bring them to the public, and then fail to complete said projects in a timely fashion, or even at all. Yes, they've done some great things; Gmail [granted in beta for what 6 years]; Google Wave [wait, that's not even finished and crashes more than a test dummy], Google Talk [still only available in North America], and... well, I really can't think of anything other than the search engine, Gmail, and kinda-sorta-almost-not-really Chrome that's really of any use. Mind you, I'm not including youtube in this because it was a finished product when G purchased it.

      Basically, G reminds me a lot of Sega of the 90's. A lot of great ideas brought to the market with poor or no support.

    • 2 years ago
  • Atalanda_Cameron
  • UWAZell
    • +1
      UWAZell  
    • Atalanda_Cameron:

      Exactly, I jump on every project they release but I too wish they would complete a project before they launch the 'next big thing' that they'll eventually leave like an old toy. And Google Wave, what an utter disappointment that's continues to be.

    • 1 year ago
  • Incredulous
    • 0
      Incredulous  

    • so when did the Features section turn into the almost exclusive domain of Current staff? 5 out of the 6 Features have been put up by Current staff...second day in a row that I've noticed this. New policy of the ever popular CEO?

    • 2 years ago
  • AndySF
    • 0
      AndySF  

    • This service was made for mobile. Seeing everyone's public updates about where they are, adding your own buzzes to local businesses, and monitoring user activity as you change your location -- that's the coolest part about Buzz. I can see local businesses using this to communicate with people nearby, or a way to figure out if there are any cool events going on in your area.

      I wish it had Facebook integration.

      Bottom line: If you don't use it on mobile, forget about it.

    • 2 years ago
  • jmsrmy
    • 0
      jmsrmy  
    • AndySF:

      AndySF wrote: Bottom line: If you don't use it on mobile, forget about it.

      I agree. I'm a bit perturbed that Buzz is not available for Android 1.5 and this would be my main platform. Does it make sense to shoot over earlier Android models to 2.0 when the idea is to get your customers involved?

      Also, unlike sgwhites, I do like to have my accounts centralized and placing Buzz within gmail compliments my style of communication. No offense, sg-

      Cheers..

    • 2 years ago
  • MRprez
    • 0
      MRprez  

    • Although it doesn't seem like it Social Networking is a great tool to share knowledge and through that knowledge we make progress... Hopefully we can filter out the basic trash of the Internet and focus on solving current issues and promoting progress

    • 2 years ago
  • officialmtcm
    • 0
      officialmtcm  

    • Honestly, someone needs to monopolize the social networking industry. Tweets, comments, and buzzes are spewing out of my ears, I'm up to my elbows in this sh*t.

    • 2 years ago
  • aaronights
    • +3
      aaronights  

    • I can imagine it now:

      '@sarahlane thats a really nice new dress you have... hows the rent coming?'
      '@sarahlane going out again for drinks? You said you'd be late with the rent because you were out of cash.'
      '@sarahlane can you keep it down after 10pm? I've got complaints from neighbors about hearing you agreeing with your boyfriend through the walls. Also, $$$ rent!'

      Here's me still hoping that social networks are just a fad, and the Internet can return to actual content in the next two years.

    • 2 years ago
  • mario_a
    • +1
      mario_a  

    • I'm pretty split, honestly. Yesterday it
      felt like a pretty cold and uninteresting experience. Google traditionally fails at social, and this felt no different. What's the upside? Why should I Buzz?

      I know, I know..."pipe down, old man."

      But today a whole bunch of folks popped into my Buzz stream and I feel more social aspects. I still feel a little uneasy, but it has promise.

      BTW -- have you given Voice another go since the iPhone web app was launched? I did and I sorta like it. Still prefer a native app, but it has it's uses (like desktop SMS!!).

    • 2 years ago
  • Paven
  • sgwhites
    • 0
      sgwhites  

    • Eh, I'm not thrilled. Honestly, I like that my Flickr and Twitter accounts are separate from my email. I don't always want to have anything centralized under one account/ID.

      I also don't like that when I enabled Buzz to check it out, it somehow automatically added two of my friends stuff to my Google Reader (even though I'd turned Buzz off pretty quickly). Not that they don't have interesting things on their lists, but I've got enough unread items all on my own.

    • 2 years ago
  • gomisensei
    • +1
      gomisensei  

    • I like it, especially the embedding, the conversation/comments setup, the no-140-character limit, and the integration with gmail.

      The main problem is it's so simple, and requires no setup, and most will decry that it's a privacy flaw. This is not so, only those you explicitly allow to see your profile can do so, but the autofollowing bit needs some work.

      The main reason for the problems is that google is trying to make it really simple with no setup, and the users who don't like to set things up usually also don't read the instructions.

    • 2 years ago
  • northrunnnercano6
sarahlane
more from Tech:
from the community

top videos