Google Buzz

Suggestion of Saxtus to add FaceBook as an alternative to Google Buzz is good, imho Therefore I have added FaceBook as an symmetrical alternative to Google Buzz. In many web discussions Google Buzz is seen as an alternative to FaceBook. If a majority disagrees, we can change it again.

I have a question on that. Should we put Facebook as alternative to Google Buzz? I mean, it does offer a service similar to this, through it's wall, but I haven't seen it as alternative service on FriendFeed, etc, so I was reluctant on putting it. Please advice.

Each user must rate the importance of privacy and his trust in Google for himself I think on AlternativeTo.net users should give each other informations, that make it easier to quickly select applications for their own personal use. Each user must rate, if the importance of privacy has top priority for himself, or whether it is more important to use new features, which are occasionally possible only if the privacy is treated subordinated. Personally, until now I had rather less fears, that Google would misuse personal information, and I like the innovative functions of Googles applications (especially Google Docs and Google Calendar and GMails quick E-Mail-Search and E-Mail-Access). In the now by EPIC criticized behavior of Google, it will depend on the correct answer by Google, if the trust in Google is charged. Personally, I am confident and would not overstate these EPIC fail, if Google reacts adequately.

EPIC filed way more complaints for Facebook (the new owners of Buzz's rival service FriendFeed), but doesn't seem anyone is bothered to fix even half of them, on the contrary, Google rushed to patch things up within hours... I am sure that those that fear so much about their privacy, are better to stay of the Internet completely because this probably wasn't the last privacy fail that they are going to see, regardless of company. Google had an "EPIC" fail, no argue there, but that's not the case anymore, until the next pitfall of course and I promise you that IT IS there and IT IS coming, Google or no Google!

My humble opinion.

EPIC Urges Federal Trade Commission to Investigate Google Buzz, Source: (2) On Feb.16th, 2010 EPIC ( Electronic Privacy Information Center) has filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission, urging the FTC to open an investigation into Google Buzz. Last week, Google tried to transform its popular email service Google Mail (1) into an untested social networking service. As a consequence, Google displayed social networking lists based on a user's most frequent address book contacts. The change was widely criticized. EPIC's complaint cites clear harms to service subscribers, and alleges that the change in business practices "violated user expectations, diminished user privacy, contradicted Google's privacy policy, and may have violated federal wiretap laws." Following (3) Google announced serious modifications to the service later in the week, but that wasn’t enough for the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC). (1) (2) http://epic.org/cgibin/mt/mt-search.cgi?IncludeBlogs=10&search=Buzz (3) http://redtape.msnbc.com/2010/02/epic-google-may-have-broken-wiretap-law.html

I agree, it's better to concentrate on facts about Buzz, than to opinions about companies and right now, Buzz appears to getting more and more ground.

What tarnished Google's name is a little bit off-topic for this place. If you're really interested we can do this in private messages and hash out something that IS on-topic to place here.