Comments on: Google Buzz Screws Up

By: Wil

Wil — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 22:21:52 +0000

Thank you. It’s been a strange week as people I used to email begin to comment on things I share on reader, and people I do not know in any capacity respond to things that, while previously public, had not previously been *pushed to their inbox*.

The fact that Google is not aware that there is a difference between those latter two disturbs me.

By: Jenn Lukas

Jenn Lukas — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 20:10:11 +0000

Excellent points – For a long time I was fine with my online presence – and never had any unfortunate stories worth telling. But then as more social avenues (MySpace, Facebook and now Buzz) have opened up – so has a larger demographic of people I know from outside my web-based work. This has caused me to re-evaluate a lot of settings and arenas I once didn’t think twice about – as a new awareness of protecting myself from, as well as appealing to in some case, different audiences has become a lot more dominant in my everyday internet usage.

Here’s one more to figure out a stand on.

By: David Sleight

David Sleight — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 19:14:38 +0000

Absolutely 100% spot-on. Buzz is an unqualified disaster on this front. Even if I use it, I’m hesitant to add contacts for fear of revealing information about them to third parties. (If I turn it off, am I opting out? etc etc etc) And I’m probably wrong about precisely how it works, but it’s so poorly designed and implemented I can’t easily find that out. Now as a user I’m forced to go on a fishing expedition, wasting my time researching settings to shut off this solution to a problem I never asked for.

Google needs to wake up to the fact that “Don’t be evil” isn’t accomplished through intention alone, but through the actual (and perceived) impact of their actions in the real world. That they’re surprised by this audience reaction speaks volumes about where they’re heading as a company.