We all know Google rules the world but have they hit a bit of a blip in their latest venture with Google Buzz. Claiming that it will be the ultimate in social networking seems for the moment to have fallen slightly short of the mark.
Google Buzz has now been active for just over a week and has already had several issues. The biggest concern for many was Google’s decision to give users an automatic group of friends based on the people they most frequently e-mail – unless you knew to change the setting in your profile this list could automatically be made public. Declaring to all who you correspond with most (this would not be a great feature if say you were a Chelsea player). This issue has been resolved quickly and Google now only suggest people who you may want to be friends with, but this was not a great start for Buzz!
This issue pales into insignificant for me personally compared to Google Buzz Mobile which updates your status and using a Google map will also show where you are updating from. This would not be a massive issue if it only showed your trusted contacts where you are but it shows anyone updating their Buzz anywhere nearby. Of course Buzz does ask if you want to share your location data when you are setting up your account but there is no way that most people could anticipate that their location would be broadcast to the world at large, I know I didn’t!
This is the first big public attack that Google has faced and their War Room is going to have to step it up a notch if they want to come out of this smelling of roses. People take their privacy very seriously and will only tolerate these sorts of issues for so long. However the public loves Google and the great apps which they have given us over the years, they will be forgiven for this blip.
Our report card for Google is ‘Must do better next time!’