So, I like Buzz, and Google's integration with Buzz on the mobile version of Google Maps is great. It's really easy to post location-tagged blurbs (buzzes?) and to see what people are saying near you (little dialog boxes show up on the map, which you can click to read). The ease of use may be a blessing and a curse.
Within hours of mass roll-out it became clear that Buzz was enabling a lot of foolish and spammy activity. For example:
A guy near me posted, "Just chillin at my house" (which revealed his real name and address along with the comment).
Several people ranting while on the freeway, "HOV FTW!!!". I'm hoping those are from passengers (yeah right). Of course, texting from your car is nothing new, but come on. Keep your bad judgement private (especially when it's attached to your real name).
Several posts along the lines of "Need computer repairs? Email me at selfpromotionalguy@gmail - $50". While there may be some value for someone in this type of post, my gut reaction is: Do Not Want.
The spam component is the most worrying to me. Viewing posts on the map already offers fairly limited value without being crowded with spammy noise. Fortunately, posts disappear from the map over time, which means the life of a spam message is limited. Still, it's trivial to set up a few accounts (and if a few, why not a few thousand) that post things like that every few hours. And if you can, you can bet someone will.
So, my point is that Buzz seems to make it really easy to be publicly foolish or spammy and that has an adverse effect on the value of the service. What do you think?
Within hours of mass roll-out it became clear that Buzz was enabling a lot of foolish and spammy activity. For example:
A guy near me posted, "Just chillin at my house" (which revealed his real name and address along with the comment).
Several people ranting while on the freeway, "HOV FTW!!!". I'm hoping those are from passengers (yeah right). Of course, texting from your car is nothing new, but come on. Keep your bad judgement private (especially when it's attached to your real name).
Several posts along the lines of "Need computer repairs? Email me at selfpromotionalguy@gmail - $50". While there may be some value for someone in this type of post, my gut reaction is: Do Not Want.
The spam component is the most worrying to me. Viewing posts on the map already offers fairly limited value without being crowded with spammy noise. Fortunately, posts disappear from the map over time, which means the life of a spam message is limited. Still, it's trivial to set up a few accounts (and if a few, why not a few thousand) that post things like that every few hours. And if you can, you can bet someone will.
So, my point is that Buzz seems to make it really easy to be publicly foolish or spammy and that has an adverse effect on the value of the service. What do you think?