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The guy in the comic that isn’t me is my friend Daniel. He came over to watch Lost last night (and show that really should always be shared with friends so you can look up what the hell is going on in the episode from multiple web-enabled mobile phones in teams) and we had this exact conversation, though admittedly with less lyrical flow.
I am taking the “grandpa on the porch” perspective towards Google Buzz and saying, “I don’t know what it is. I don’t WANT to know what it is, and I made it this far without it so I know I don’t needs it!”
If you feel strongly about Google Buzz, feel free to try and convince me in the comments.
I started playing with it (cause we kinda had to due to the default settings) and then dropped it after about 24 hours. Besides all the security flaws, it brings nothing to the table that I don't already have with FB and Twitter. I'm going to throw this one in the "what was Google thinking" pile right alongside Wave.
If Facebook didn't keep fucking up their design and keep trying to dictate to me the order in which I should read people's posts, and if my friends weren't so fucking addicted to Mafia wars and 80 gazillion other useless apps, Buzz would have zero appeal. As it is, it has greater than zero appeal, but not much.
I think buzz is a huge leap over twitter. Then again, I always have gmail up. It's like a facebook without the applications, and location-enabled if you post via phone. Also, easier to share links/photos.
Twitter is full of mystery bit.ly links and spam. Facebook is full of annoying-ass applications and malware. This is useful and cool.
Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, Buzz, etc. – I'm too busy having a real life to mess around with this "social" software.
I have a Twitter account – for the life of me I still can't figure out what's the big deal.
Wait… What happened with Google Wave? I had some friends who were going to play D&D on it, but we hadn't gotten around to it yet. Is it dead or something? How is Google Buzz different?
Wave is a cross between email and instant messaging. Buzz is a cross between Twitter and a simplified Facebook. No relation really.
Wave isn't dead, in as much as it's still there if you want to use it, it just seems not many people are interested. It could be pretty cool for online role-playing though.
Well, they should cross Wave with Buzz and maybe, just maybe, they'd have something worth giving a shit about.
…Maybe.
Well, they should cross Wave with Buzz and maybe, just maybe, they'd have something worth giving a shit about.
…Maybe.
Google Wuzz? Bave? Buve? Wazz?
Buzz is like Facebook, only without all the stupid flood of information from people joining groups, and playing stupid games.
It's like Twitter, only with smoother notifications of blog posts and posted pictures.
And it has integration with Google Reader, which I started using a few months back to share links with friends, and it is HAWT.
I have no idea what Buzz is, and I am hoping the fact that I have an infrequently-used gmail account is not compromising my privacy in some nearly unintelligible way. Until somebody informs me that it is, I am going to ignore it. (Heck, I don't even have Twitter, and I got my first cell phone last month. I'm even more grandpa-ish than you.)
By the way, I really love the drawing and facial expressions in this comic. I keep going back up to look and laughing. (The phone-face-smush is a nice touch.)
thanks!
Buzz is googlefacebooktwitter.
Glad to know I'm not the only curmudgeonly grandpa on the porch :).
I had a grandpa on the porch approach to Twitter itself, but I can't see another competing service being anything but trouble for everyone involved. That's the thing with social networking and communication. The only way to "compete" is to drag people out of the network they already have just because yours is "better" in some way. Even though none of their friends are in it. Which defeats the whole point of this sort of thing.
Do we see a new character or just another of the great Peripatetica?
I finally got onto Facebook after months of nagging by associates. I was horrified to discover that people I'd assumed were kind of intelligent or otherwise interesting, weren't.
They're fans of Julia Roberts. They like homemade fan videos of scenes from Twilight backed with faceless emo music They join groups where an arbitrary number of people are demanding action about something. They grant their approval to videos featuring little kids hitting elders in the gonads. They waste four hours a day with pointless busywork like Farmville and Mafia Wars. Their status updates are about deciding if they want Italian or Chinese Food for dinner. They can't go ten minutes without posting every single vapid thought that passes briefly through their brain.
I gradually ended up feeling very, very scared and alone. I'm surrounded by *morons*, and I honestly had no idea things had gotten that bad out there. I took my profile down, just in case anyone thinks the same of me.
This reply has nothing whatsoever to do with your comment… I just wanted to say I love the fact that you posted as "Anonymous Bosch." FABULOUS.
@ Anonymous Bosch
I feel the same way, I have never used ANY “social” sites. I have a few co-workers that do, hell even my mom uses facebook I can’t figure out the appeal. I admit I am not a socialite but that’s because I am a salesman in the furniture business.I deal with and “listen” to enough morons from 9-6 all week I really don’t care what other people are up to. If I need to talk to someone I call them, If someone needs to talk to me they call me end of story.
I was thinking about starting a twitter account just mess with people but that is to much work.
See, I got into Facebook in college when it was a choice between jettisoning a good half of my tediously built-by-hand "social network" or hop on the bandwagon. Back when it was just college students, it was interesting because it allowed you to keep up with the goings on around campus. Even in a small school like mine (1800 students, all lived on campus), you'd miss hearing about an event you wanted to see even if you were the most informed person.
But then they added high school students. Then people who didn't have a .edu e-mail. And then the goddamn apps…
I got into Facebook just so I can get out of the hell hole that was Myspace. I loved the fact that I didnt have to see another Slipnot/Korn/Weed/Juggallo background and flashing graphics and the horrible MIDI music. Facebook was just such a nice escape from that. It was clean, professional, and just so much better. Now over the years since then Facebook has gotten to big for its briches. Ive been using Twitter for over a year and love it. I dont get any app invites or requests to join a page. Its text and nothing but text. I dont care I love it. I also have started using Rooster Teeths community as a side to Facebook and Myspace. But thats just because I love that site.
I think my point ran off into a different territory there. Well to sum it up, I went to Facebook in high school because it was better and cleaner than Myspace. It was nice to be on a Social Networking site where people acted like adults and not 6th graders.
The bigger a social network gets (i.e. Facebook) the more it has to really suck, and the more a new contender has to be absolutely great, before the new guy can get a foothold.
But in this case, Facebook doesn't suck enough, and Buzz just isn't that great. Beyond the Gmail users who already will have it by default, I don't see it gaining much share from FB.
Soooo…
I tried out Buzz today, and i found Twitter with commentary system and some more functions. Screw it. I don’t really use Gmail anyway.
Since I was already deep in the Google account it made sense I guess. My favorite thing about it is that since I already use Google Reader to keep track of all the blogs, webcomics, forums and whatnot I look at on a semi-regular basis, I can just click "like" on something in Reader to post it to Buzz, comment optional, instead of e-mailing. I try not to forward too much bullshit.