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Google Buzz

Avatar Lionel Ogden
I was surprised to read in the Tech column of the Observer this week that if you are a subscriber to googlemail then you are automatically subscribed to Google Buzz their new Social Networking site. Not only that but all the senders of your received messages and the receivers of your sent messages are automatically added to your "friends". These are publicly viewable until you log on and choose otherwise.

Naughty Google! They got very upset about the Chinese authorities hacking into their site and then they hand any repressive regime in the world the ability to check anyone's e-mail contacts by just going to their Buzz account. Anyone who thout Googlemail may be more secure than ordinary e-mail may need to think again.

Apparently the first time you realise it is when you receive a cryptic e-mail in your googlemail in box. However in view of the fact that I have not yet noticed this particular e-mail, it could be that Buzz is not yet available for the Mac. Be warned an be aware.

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Douglas Cheney
Google Buzz is on for the Mac I have noticed it when I log on to my Google Mail account, but no funny e mails as such yet

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar John Surtees

If its not available on the Mac yet, it soon will be. See the MacBook in the demo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuThg91-4Nw&feature=channel

How on Earth can a company like Google be so ignorant and disregarding of peoples privacy. These people really need to spend a bit more time out in the real world.

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Eric Jervis
It might not only be Google. I had a cryptic email from a neighbour in France last week alleging that he would like to add me to his special friends category or something, and all I had to do was to 'click on this' to make my future email experience so much more exciting. This seemed so unlikely, bearing in mind that he's a bloke of about fiftyish, and not notably nerdy, and I didn't entirely see the point, that I sent him an ordinary email saying'????????'. As far as I can make out his experience had been the same as mine, and I decided, possibly erroneously, that it was a result of us both being with Yahoo, he with Yahoo.fr and me with Yahoo.co.uk. Possibly these people are in league with Gormless Gordon's Gestapo?

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Mick Burrell
Lionel, do you have any more information on this? I ask as I have a Google mail account which I use exclusively for a mailing list to do with coding software. This is quite an active list but despite that having looked at Buzz there are no messages and no e-mail addresses visible as far as I can see. If they automatically listed the people sending me e-mail then I would have expected at least the address of the mailing list if not each contributor. I have neither unless I'm looking in the wrong place.

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Lionel Ogden
I understand that not all googlemail accounts have yet been updated with buzz. For further information you could checkout the Observer on line.

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Mark Ford
This is what it says when I go to my Google Mail via a notifier in my Menu Bar:

"New! Google Buzz in Google Mail

Share updates, photos, videos and more.
Start conversations about the things that you find interesting.

Everything in one place
Follow your friends and get recommended
buzz from others — all within Google Mail.

Inbox integration
Comments appear right in your inbox so it's
easy to keep the conversation going."

It then has a box to click marked "Cool! Check out Buzz" There is an option to go straight to the inbox and check Buzz later

Cool - its positively chilling!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/feb/16/google-buzz-apology

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Mick Burrell
I've been offered Buzz - it's appeared as an option - but done nothing about it as it doesn't appeal to me. I was going by your first comment which says "you are automatically subscribed" - it appears I might not be.

Reading about it as suggested, it seems people thought you were automatically subscribed but whether you weren't or that's what's been changed already is not terribly clear. I've just elected to "follow" someone I know who has a Gmail address. It shows me his public profile (which I assume he's made public) and says he has 7 followers - it shows the three who have public profiles and says "and four more without public profiles". It gives no email addresses for any of them and no information at all about the other four. Similarly, he has 17 people following him and I can see the public profiles of 6 but no information about the other 11.

You can search for people (that's how I found him) but I cannot find me nor another friend with a Gmail address who I know has not "signed up". The last thing I've tried is searching for a known Gmail address - nothing found. I cannot find anything about anyone except what they've put on a public profile. Of course, that does not mean that someone else with more knowledge than me may be able to!

Don't get me wrong, I'm no fan of Google's general tactics and don't want to seem to be defending them but if they did overstep the mark, as far as I can see, they've taken a step back and corrected it very quickly.

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Mick Burrell
And if you're worried - or just plain don't want it - turn it off. At the very bottom of the Gmail window (that's the normal window for mail, not Buzz) in the second from bottom line, there's a tiny link "turn off buzz". Of course, if your's says "turn on Buzz" it's already off.

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Douglas Cheney
If you open Buzz up and go to the bottom of the page and click on turn Buzz off it opens a new window where you have the option to remove Buzz from Google Mail

Re: Google Buzz

Avatar Lionel Ogden
I suppose this is where the term "buzz- off" came from in a different universe
 
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