Google Wave
Google wave
Invites for Wave were sent to 100000 people by Google on 1st Oct (or was it 30 Sep). Anyway they were sent from Melbourne, so you can calculate the time. Why I say this is because technology has made time more complicated. But that’s not the topic of this post.
What is Google Wave?
It is another tool for collaboration. But like other Google tools, this will have a great impact on the social media circuit. Because, Google claims that it will relpace social networking sites like Facebook. And only the other day we were talking about the rise of social media. Whew! Things change so fast out here!!!!!
The core of Google Wave is the wavelet which an initiator can send out to friends and other guys. Once a wavelet is created others in the network or even the world at large can comment upon it in real time. What you see is people collaborating with you in real time. This is a huge upgrade on existing social media where you cannot communicate in real time.
The popularity of Google Wave can be seen from the fact that invites for it are already being auctioned on EBay for as much as $5000. But I would not recommend anyone to buy an invite. Not just now. The creators of wave have already announced that it is a beta. That means it still has some rough edges to be smoothened out. It is like the good old days of gmail- People begging around for invites. I suppose Google loves a bit of drama to keep things lively.
Implications
Where is this leading us? Difficult to say at this moment. Surely Facebook and MySpace won’t drop dead, at least not in the immediate future. The collaboration tools look almost like a real time blog – as I said this is huge. Will normal guys who like to write on the Facebook wall take to Wave? At present there is no fun element in Wave which I am sure is engaging the brains at Google. I for one find it an attractive option because I can do everything from a single platform. No need to login and logout from different sites. When I look into the future, Google Chrome OS looms large in the horizon. This is going to happen in 2010. Having lightweight operating system (free to boot) with a built-in great search algorithm along with collaboration tools (free Office tools) and everything working together is a big plus. I think we must become early adopters of Wave because that’s where the action is going to take place.
Microsoft Bing, Silverlight and online Office collaboration tools
Microsoft is building its own platform for the future web. But what I see as their greatest limitation is lack of openness. With their proprietary systems, it is unlikely that they will succeed in this free for all market. But stranger things have happened. So I won’t write them off – not just now anyway.
