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Google To Challenge Facebook Again
Hugh Pickens writes "Google is set to make a fresh attempt to gain a foothold in the booming social networking business, seeking to counter the growing threat that Facebook poses to some of its core services. USA Today reports that the search giant is upgrading Gmail to add social-media tools similar to those found on Facebook, including photo and video sharing within the Gmail application, along with a new tool for status updates. According to reports, Google is planning to give Gmail users a way to aggregate the updates of their various contacts on the service, creating a stream of notifications that would echo the similar real-time streams from Facebook and Twitter. Google's decision to exploit the heavily-used Gmail service as the basis for its latest assault on the social networking business partly reflects the failure of Google's previous stand-alone efforts to enter the social networking sector. Its Orkut networking service, though launched before Facebook, has failed to gain a mass following in most parts of the world, despite success in Brazil, and its acquisition of Twitter rival Jaiku ended in failure after it scrapped development of the service." Update: 02/09 19:32 GMT by KD : It's been announced as Google Buzz; CNET has a detailed writeup.
Although it would take quite a few HCI PhDs to figure out how to do it all without cluttering an already cluttery gmail UI.
An old-timer with old-timey ideas.
Neither company values privacy and just wants all the data for advertising so what difference does it make?
I think many people (though probably not enough) already worry about what Google and Facebook separately know and track about their online and private lives. Putting them both together under the control of just one of those companies? No thanks. A million times no.
Where Google can offer clear cut advantage, it's easy to see them dominating. Online search was ripe for such a revolution. Other things like answers.google.com just didn't make 'em enough money. Social networking needed a revolution and Facebook emerged as the winner. Friendster couldn't do it and MySpace became irrelevent through obsolescence. What I think had made Google such a success has been it's openness towards developers and Facebook beat Google to that game by allowing developers to use it's services (which is torn from Google's own playbook). Google can try but I think they're gonna fail on this one, Facebook people are way too entrenched in it now. I, for one, will avoid Google simple because I just don't like how big they've become.
Google will fail to get a foothold for one reason laziness, the masses will not want to change over their account to something else. There is little innovation to be had in social media and the little tweaks that facebook does not copy from google will not be enough for people to deal with the hassle of changing.
Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
I really do not want a constant flow of inane jibberings from every person in my gmail contact list day after day. This would drive me totally mad. Presumably there will be an opt out?
I will not use this until I can play Farmville on it and send people were-pigs and pork-knights so they can defend themselves properly.
Innovation and producing the "Next Big Thing" is the more difficult but potentially more rewarding path.
Slapping lipstick on your competitor's pig is the easy shortcut.
Does it really matter whom you upload your private data to? Once it is out of your hands, it does not matter if it is with google, facebook, yahoo or msn
NO!
NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!
Did I mention, NO?
I am already annoyed, pissed off, angry and fed up with having to use lame gmail and other core Google services on my Android device. I have PRIVATE business contacts in there. I have NO PERSONAL CONTACTS.
I do not want them seeing each other, seeing when I am online, what I am doing, where I am, or anything of the sort! I use corporate email, not silly gmail for emailing my clients, both from my phone and from my desktop. The *only* reason I use gmail is for the calendar and contacts that I am *FORCED* to keep there.
If Google makes me, or my company the least bit *more* uncomfortable with this situation, we'll be moving to Blackberries.
BAH!
Google has gone so far downhill, I've actually tried Bing!. I *HATE* Microsoft. I _LOATH_ them. Google is just getting so bad, however, I had to try!
Heck, it's almost impossible to search for what you want on Google now, as it constantly changes your search terms. You pretty much have to add a + in front of every search keyword, in order to get what you want. Shouldn't that be opt-out? You know, an "actually search for things I asked for, not things you suggest" option?
Now they have those idiotic search suggestions, while you are typing. Annoying, and slow. About 1% of the time I search for something (I'm in IT, I search hundreds of times per day), the Google redirect domain they use is slow, and you have to reload to get where you want to go. Now they have personalized searches, which of course just makes things worse.. so now I have to randomize all Google cookies using a Firefox app.
What is wrong with these people?
If Google pimps up GMail enough, with file-sharing, social networking, instant-messaging, and gee-whiz features, it will get blocked at our firewall as a security risk.
Right now, Google Chat is blocked. Google Voice is blocked. YouTube is blocked. Google Docs is blocked.
Keep it up, Google, and I won't be able to use much Google at all at work.
Now, for those of you who have no responsibilities, feel free to flame on and explain why my corporate masters are shortsighted, maniacally obsessed with control, and oblivious to reality in their vain attempt to secure the corporate data, protect our customers' information, and be responsible to the shareholders. It starts out as funny, then becomes annoying, and finally settles into a tragic display of ignorance of the reality of large corporation security issues.
It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye. Or $50 million.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
I think you're crazy if you believe that the 13-20 crowd is even vaguely aware of the concept of online security. In my experience they view privacy and security as hurdles, not assets, for the products they use online.
Check out my lame java blog at www.javachopshop.com
Maybe I should rephrase it.
I think that security is one niche that Google can exploit, since Facebook has failed on that front, and Google has a good reputation in that area.
Really, though, there needs to be a "feature" that is exciting for the young crowd.
Imagine something like Webkinz, where kids under 13 are already addicted. Funnel those kids into a social network when they reach 13, duplicate facebook's features, and then they'll never need to join fb. In 5 years, you have 13 to 18 year olds hooked on your fb replacement.
> Google needs to find one niche for the age 13-20 crowd
> Personally, I think that niche is security.
You must know different 13-20 year olds than I do.