#88 Google Wave, Buzz, and Mobile

For the past week or so, I've been watching people drop like flies from Facebook. There's been a huge uproar on the internet over the most popular social networking site's alleged lack of concern for their over 400 million members' privacy. This is not just a matter of someone giving out TMI. In April, Facebook announced the Open Graph API, which basically means that users' information can show up on sites other than Facebook, without the user's permission and without their even being logged in. Thus, if you type in the phrase "how do I" on Google, the first option that appears is "delete my Facebook account".

If you don't mind that potentially everything you put on Facebook is public, and you don't mind that Facebook will still have your stuff even after you delete your account, and you don't mind large corporations following your Facebook presence in order to better sell you something, you probably could remain happy with Facebook, as long as you don't unwittingly compromise the privacy of anyone you've friended.

So where have all the Facebook users gone? One place you might find them is on Google Buzz. While I can't claim to know all the ins and outs of the site, Google Buzz seems similar to Facebook; it is for social networking, and it is supposed to allow the user control over whether content is public or private. I'm a bit skeptical about Google's claim about the privacy thing, especially since the company owns Doubleclick technology and probably most of the web already.

Google Wave is an interesting project being studied in Google Labs. Students, coworkers, or just about anyone who is working on a collaborative project could use Wave to share ideas, sources, and photos in real time. I wanted to try it myself, but currently it is an invitation only site, so I'm not using any collaborative tools at present.

Mobile technology is amazing and just keeps getting better. Of course Google is right there offering all kinds of products that can be used as long as you have a web-enabled phone. You can search the internet, check your Gmail, access your aggregator, and more. I don't have a mobile phone, but I think having access to Google maps or Mapquest while on the road would be a life-saver and I'd probably use those tools frequently. My absolute favorite Google phone app though, is the new Googles Translates software for smart phones. Fascinating!



Image from Time online.

#87 Google Reader

I shouldn't be surprised to learn that Google has its own version of a feed aggregator. What I would like to know is, what exactly is all this vitally important information? Is someone monitoring the Swiss particle accelerator for impending black holes? Checking the movement of the tectonic plates in anticipation of the final dissolution of the earth's crust so they make it to the Ark on time? Afraid of losing their one and only chance to find their soul mate on Matchmaker.com because someone else was updated more quickly?

It's hard for me to imagine a situation where typing in a URL (or several), or a search keyword constitutes hardship, but I can understand trying to be organized. Taking advantage of tools to better manage one's time is certainly a respectable endeavor. I told an unemployed friend about Google Reader after I came across an interesting article. I want my friend's job search to be successful and thought using an aggregator might be helpful. It can't hurt to cast your biggest net (no pun intended), right? Besides, it could make a good impression on a potential employer if my friend said he found some leads while using a feed aggregator.

Otherwise, I signed up for Bloglines in a previous training and subscribed to a number of feeds related to books and reading, such as NPR Topics: Books, NYT Books, and Alltop, but so far I'm not really hooked on aggregators. I just don't seem to have the type of information requirements that make me feel I'm missing a whole lot by not using a feed reader more regularly. On the contrary, the sheer volume of material that materializes when I log into Bloglines is already a bit daunting. Any time I gain by having a bunch of feeds on one site is immediately canceled out as I either:

1.) get lost wading through the nonessential uninspiring stuff that gets pulled in because I decided to subscribe to a certain blog, for example, or
2.) get stuck on the computer for even more inordinate amounts of time because I got distracted by all the pretty headlines beckoning to me.

Maybe I just haven't yet found the particular feeds that would really interest me. Maybe I need an aggregator for my aggregator. Please don't tell Google I said that.