After Google Buzz launched to a lot of hype and controversy in early February, it looked like it could become a big hit for Google – especially after the company fixed some of the early privacy flaws that plagued Buzz in its early days. These days, however, a lot of us on the RWW team have noticed that the number of interactions on Buzz seems to have declined rapidly. While a lot of people are still sharing their blog posts, Flickr and Twitter items on Buzz, the number of comments and likes on most posts is pretty low.
Did Buzz Ever Reach the Mainstream?
Google Buzz never caught on with mainstream users, even though Google pushed Buzz into every Gmail user’s accounts. There are obviously still some major usability issues around Buzz and most Gmail users who see Buzz for the first time aren’t likely to even understand the basic ideas behind Buzz.
The concept of Buzz – while immediately clear to anybody who ever used FriendFeed – is relatively novel. Google also never did a good job at explaining Buzz to new users and unless the company starts to make Buzz easier to use and explains its features to new users, Buzz will remain a niche product. Right now, even figuring out how to import content from third-party sites is way to hard.
Are You Still Using Google Buzz?
Popurl’s Thomas Marban took a closer look at the content on Buzz today and found that “the most commonly published links [on public Buzz streams] only included the usual suspects such as Facebook, Foursquare and other social media spam.”
Marban’s experience mirrors our own and that of quite a few of the people we have talked to. What’s your experience with Buzz? Are you still using it? Or did you forget about it after the early rush of excitement? Did you turn Buzz off after all the privacy issues became known? Are any of your non-geek friends ever use it? Let us know in the comments.
