George Hall Online

I don't mind gadgets or OSes that have some built-in difficulty, just so long as they're intuitive to work out.

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I've been using the mobile version of Google Buzz on my phone and my desktop's Safari browser since the weekend, hardly needing to go into Gmail.

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I have to admit it's time for a NON-Buzz post.

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It's amazing what a difference a week makes in the tech space.

Before this week the big tech news was the iPad announcement.  Assuming no one else's big announcements, it probably still would have been the topic on everyone's lips.

However, this was Buzz week.  It's on everyone's lips for the past three days since Google activated it.

The stats for the past three days show that Buzz is looking forward to a bright future.  They're huge numbers for such a short time, although that's to be expected with integration into Gmail.

Is there much iPad news about?  Actually I found a snippet tonight and it's something I'm quite happy about.

Although everyone's joking about the iPad being an overgrown iPOD, what should set it apart are some decent apps like iWork and perhaps a good graphics app.

Apple already announced a new updated version of iWork which suits the iPad, but now hot on their heels comes news that Microsoft are looking at the idea of OFFICE on the iPad.

Now that would be interesting.  A choice of two great office suites for the device.  That'll raise it above being a mere iPod immediately.

So who's coming up with the graphic app?

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Day two of Google Buzz brought activation of the Buzz link in my Gmail.

So while the mobile version was good, the real thing on my laptop was better.  You wouldn't believe the fun I had once I could Buzz in earnest.

Since I've been on Friendfeed the past year, like a lot of other Friendfeed regulars, I had no problems adapting to Google Buzz.  It was also great to see Robert Scoble starting some great threads, something he'd dropped back a bit from after Friendfeed's founders ended up working for Facebook.

My Gmail inbox only fills up with Buzzes where I've joined a conversation that someone else has started.  In the Buzz section itself, all the people I follow post either short updates, or start a thread.  My Google profile rounds it out in showing me all the Buzzes I've personally done.

Perhaps that's where I've a small complaint...although this is all theoretically integrated, I tend to think it misses a consistent UI.  At the moment I have to have a tab for Reader, a tab for Buzz/Gmail and a tab for my profile to really get the best use.  Sure, I can share anything in Reader TO Buzz, but I'm not seeing it from Reader, so it's not quite the integration I'd feel the most comfortable with.

That's about my only real complaint.  I can still share things from elsewhere any number of ways.  It's that versatile.

Then it really comes into its own when I apply the search box.  We have two search buttons next to the box, one for searching Buzzes, the other for searching the Web.  That's where you get signal instead of noise, searching for just a specific name or topic and watching the Buzzes for that search come into view, whether it be a short update or a bigger thread/discussion.

I've seen a couple of Buzzes earlier today mentioning various search operators which can also be used, not unlike how its done in Friendfeed.

Of course, some new people are scratching their heads on the style of Buzz, but anyone with Friendfeed experience is having the time of their lives.  Since the sale of Friendfeed (or actually the founders) to Facebook, a lot of FF regulars have been wanting something as good.  Now they've found it.

And there's going to be some brilliant jokes or "buzz-words" cropping up any second.

So...and yes, this is going to be a groaner...the Buzz is building.

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Google's Buzz is up and running.

The beauty of Buzz is that Friendfeed's fans will feel at home with it.

In essence, if someone like Robert Scoble puts an update out over buzz, as they did over at Friendfeed with him, his contacts can have a whole conversation from that point on.

Where it differs from Friendfeed is that it's integrated into your Gmail account.

So if you've already got some friends via the Gmail address book, you already have a starter group to "buzz."  Not just that, think of the size of the user base.

You can share privately or publicly.  You can use photos with it.  You can import from Picasa, Flickr and Google Reader.  Plus, you already have a spam filter.

At the moment my laptop's access to Google hasn't received the update to buzz, whereas my iPhone can access buzz via the mobile Buzz site.

I have to admit, it's renewed some enthusiasm for Google stuff.  My contacts on Google Reader are small compared to my Twitter account.

And it's faster by far than Google Wave.

While I like Wave, Buzz is a lot closer to where I think Wave should be.  I daresay that will be clearly demonstrated in the next few weeks.  I also think former and current Friendfeed users will be at the forefront of using Buzz to do a better job than Wave.

Perhaps that'll spur the Wave developers to move forward with some much-needed changes.

Of course, Wave and Buzz are both horses in the same Google stable, so it's no real problem.

General verdict on Buzz?  Out of ten?  Very nearly a ten.

At least until I see how much bandwidth it chews up...

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It seems to be the week for new changes in online services to be rolled out.  It wasn't more than a few days ago Facebook was bringing out the change to users' Home layout.

Now Google is about to unveil a new module in Gmail.

As this technology article in the Wall Street Journal points out, we can look forward to social media style updates without having to move from our Gmail screen.

This should be quite interesting when you think of all the Google properties which roughly correspond to say, yFrog or Twitvid.   Google already have Google FriendConnect, Picasa, Youtube, just to name a few.  Throw in Google Maps natively there...

According to Techcrunch, what's going to be announced should also make it easier to view media in Gmail.

So will this new form of Google social updates be mainly for all the friends you have in the Googleverse?  Or will it tie into your existing social update sites?

We'll know by 10am U.S. Pacific Time on the 9th of February.  As Mashable points out, tech media have been invited to an event at Google HQ at that time for a big announcement or two.

Now if we could only get Google to announce they've sped up Wave considerably...

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On the first anniversary of Black Saturday, Flowerdale, Kinglake and a couple of other communities between them put up signs asking the media to respect the need for private commemoration.

Kinglake set aside a designated media area.  Flowerdale asked the media not attend at all.

It was not really a day for gawking, especially in towns still healing from the destructive forces of last year's bushfires.

It is presumed these signs applied mainly to TV, radio and newspaper media.

Did they also apply to SOCIAL media?

I'll put it to you this way:  if you were some young, late-teens, up-and-coming social media person who'd never have heard of these towns before this week and you came to the service wanting to live-blog, you'd have been the least welcome.  If you'd been a Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr star just blowing in for yesterday with any form of Twitvid, Tweetmic or big camera, you'd have been lumped in with the old media.

You had to at least have done something tangible during February and March last year or been part of helping recovery in the months afterward to have even felt welcome joining the locals at these community services.

At Flowerdale, Pete Williams would have been the most welcome social media identity because of his links to the town through family, also for his major role in helping the town pull itself back up by its bootstraps.

I have only a very small link to Flowerdale through last year's Twitter relaying of emergency tweets.  I remember especially the night I first saw Pete's tweets coming through, telling of what was happening in Flowerdale and the obstacles they were facing there.  I made a small trip to there in early March last year.  Pete knows me from the #bushfires hashtag during that time and also from July when he needed someone to film a sustainable housing workshop in Kinglake.

Pete and I had a brief chat at the Flowerdale service yesterday, but only he was entitled to take a photo or two of it, for the Flowerdale community's blog.  Anyone else doing that would have been intrusive.

It's one of those times even social media must use commonsense and discretion.  It didn't matter whether you were old media or new media yesterday at Flowerdale.  You couldn't go there as ANY sort of media person.  You could only really be there supporting someone you knew from there.  Only as a mate or a relative.  Only as a private person respecting the day and the people.

Even at Kinglake, yesterday wasn't the day to be a rubber-necking gawker.  If you walked down the street to the Kinglake CFA and saw a sign indicating a private function for the CFA's own observance of the day, you walked away and respected it.

There was only one place one was invited to look, down the road at the Kinglake West hall, where an art show was taking place. 

Various works by local artists were here,  in a variety of different artistic media, including one unique material.  The most unique image used garbage bags to show a blackened tree and its surrounds.  When you stepped back you saw how effective it was at conveying its message.

There were some artworks on local flora and fauna.  However, a majority were about Black Saturday.  The most common color was orange and red, indicative of the intensity of the flames a year before.

One painting stood out though.  A painting of a phoenix, the mythical bird of ancient times known for rising anew from the ashes of its own destruction.

That's the best metaphor for these communities.

They're too tough to die, as a sign on the outskirts of Kinglake puts it.  Especially up at Flowerdale.

They don't let things like Black Saturday dim their hope of the future.  They crawl out of that time and pull themselves up by their bootstraps with a little help from their friends, expecting only a hand UP, not a hand OUT.

Like a phoenix rising from the ashes.

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My partner was furious that I and her brother had the new Facebook Home layout before she did.  That's how impressed she was with it.  She liked seeing it on my page so much she wanted it too.

It's a good layout choice.  It's cleaner and less busier than it was prior to this. 

Friend request, messages and notifications become icons over on the top left, everything is organised down the left side for your various types of updates, then your applications and finally your online friends.

Over on the top right are the Home, Profile and settings links.

Search is now more prominently featured in the top middle, then underneath are the updates from Facebook friends.  There are two categories of news feed now, Recent and Top Stories.  Nice and effective.

Generally this new layout is a long-overdue feature and makes the home page a better experience.  One would presume that the acquisition of Friendfeed has gone a long way to helping such improvements along, especially the Friendfeed founders' expertise with real-time updating.

Perhaps Facebook should acquire Robert Scoble and Michael Arrington next.

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Apple rumors are always an interesting read.

Sometimes the rumors are a bit skewed, sometimes they're incredibly spot-on.

In recent months I think the rumors about the iPad tended to lean more toward pretty darn accurate.

The debate over the iPad using iPhone OS rags on, though generally the majority of opinion on it is positive.

The newest Apple rumor going around is that another iPad is on its way, but this one will have something more akin to OS X.

I guess I wouldn't be surprised by that, as I'm sure Steve Jobs would be cluey enough to see if there were a market for both types of iPad and keep the OS X version at the ready.

This article here points out that it was thought there were two versions of the iPad in development, before last week's announcement.

In my family, my partner and the nine-year-old would favor the iPhone OS version, whereas I'd like BOTH the iPhone OS one AND the OS X one.

So that's a pretty good example of the fact a market for both types of iPad exists.

Of course, at the moment, rumors of an OS X version iPad are still just that, rumors. Steve Jobs won't be confirming anything right now.  He's too savvy a businessman to dent the sales of the iPhone OS iPad or segment them by bringing an OS X iPad out too soon.

In the meantime, we can drool and dream about the idea, though.

Related Articles:

Out Comes The iPad

iPad Humor

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