Google Wave revisited
Posted on 14. Jan, 2010 by Kenny in Reviews, Technology
Several months ago I went on and on about Google Wave. However, I jumped on Wave last night and it was my first time on in about a month.
Oops.
So, I figured I’d take a look back and see what I think now that the newness has worn off.
Positives:
- I still think it’s pretty incredible. There are some great conversations happening on the wave right now. There are some things I’m thinking about right now that were initially inspired by a resource list on a wave.
- I’m hearing voices I don’t always hear… and it’s refreshing. There are some people who are very active on the waves that either don’t blog or don’t blog very much. Certainly a blog is a great way to get into someone’s brain, but not everyone is game for blogging. On wave I’ve been able to learn from those people.
- It’s a big win for collaboration. I’m seeing so many people helping each other and it’s never been easier.
Negatives:
- Not everyone’s on. It’s a walled garden. I may write a blog post and a few hundred people read it (although I’ll probably only get 2 comments) becasue it’s indexed well and people are coming from all over. With Wave I probably have a higher level of participation, but the only people who can view my thoughts are the people I invited. Not the bigger crowd I can get from a blog post.
- It’s buggy. This is a preview version, so I’m not going to give them a hard time, I’m just grateful I’ve been able to benefit for so long from a program that isn’t officially released.
- It didn’t replace email. One of the ideas behind Wave was that it would reinvent the way we email and even replace email. At this current point, I just don’t see that happening.
- Out of site, out of mind. Google Wave is not connected to my gmail account so I don’t get any notifications of new waves or responses. Literally, I forgot and a month went by where I didn’t check my waves. Maybe they’ll integrate this later, but this isn’t good.
Overall, I’m still a big fan. I jumped on the wave tonight and caught up on all the conversations. I think I have a way to be a little more involved in the future though. I found this last week. It’s a addon for Firefox, a Google Wave notifier. So now I have a little Wave icon in the bottom right corner of my screen and when new waves come, I can quickly click on the link. I haven’t had much time to try it, but I’m betting this will help me stay connected even better.
4 Responses to “Google Wave revisited”
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Susan Hughes
14. Jan, 2010
I”m feeling the same way – I forget to get on there & check things out. For blogs, google reader brings it all to me. It’s way easier to check one place than to jump into different waves & scroll through them.
Sam
14. Jan, 2010
Agree. I like how it facilitates a conversation like twitter and email don’t. I am with you I like connecting with other people who I don’t normally. I got all my blog posts this week from Chris’ wave where he interview Dr. Willard.
Overall I like the place wave has in my life. I do not go on that often but don’t feel I miss anything because of it. I like that.
I also agree that it has not and will not for a long time replace email. It may but they have tons of work to do to get people to that place eventually if ever.
Anthony Prince
14. Jan, 2010
Agreed – out of sight, out of mind.
Adding the firefox add-on should help out a ton – thanks for sharing!
Kenny
14. Jan, 2010
Yeah, I’ve got the add-on installed right now, but no one has updated any waves since I added it last night… so I don’t know if and how it works. When I booted up this morning, it seemed like it logged out as well, so I had to double-click on it to sign in. At the very least, it’s sitting in the bottom right tray of firefox… so I see it and it would serve as a little reminder… but I figure it’s going to alert me when a wave is updated. We’ll see.