Google Buzz goes live – details and reactions
Posted on | February 9, 2010 | View Comments
Google Buzz has gone live and the initial reactions are flowing in. The product will integrate many new social networking features into the already popular Google Mail system. Speculation is that some see this as Google’s attempt to steal market share from all of the hot social sites such as Foursquare, Twitter, and Facebook. While the details are still coming in, it really seems to me that this is a way to hop into the spotlight and become a real social media hub as I described in this post last week. This is probably a move by Google to strategically position themselves against Facebook’s email project, Titan.
Google Buzz will have an API (details here) to really pave the way for an open social media system, something that Facebook has been criticized for in the past. It will also allow a mobile app for posting by voice. There will be heavy integration with Google Maps to allow users to view nearby postings and bring a local feel to social networking, similar to Foursquare. XML Feeds will be available as well.
Google Buzz is also planned to launch as a corporate product later this year, as part of their premiere suite of applications.

