Google have just launched Google Buzz, a new feature in Gmail that allows users to “Share updates, photos, videos, and more”. In short, it’s Google’s answer to Twitter. My initial impressions are positive, though a little cynical…

What I like

It has some neat features, such as aggregating content from (a small list of) other sites and geotagging when “buzzing” from your mobile. The geotagging alone could be game changing as it’s the first “proper” attempt by one the big players to do a real mobile social network. Set-up is as quick as it gets as you automatically follow those in your contact list and it’s integrated nicely into your Inbox so you could end up using Buzz almost by accident.

The interface is of course very Google, so it’s without fuss and very familiar.

Overall it seems like it’s a better version of Twitter.

What I don’t like

The problem with it for me is two-fold:

1) It’s yet another social network
2) It’s for Gmail users.

The web is littered with social networks now and without a niche I can’t really see Buzz getting much traction. At the moment there just isn’t any reason to move from Twitter or Facebook.

Its integration with Gmail is also both a blessing and a curse – Buzz has an instant user base, but if your email is with another supplier would you really want to create a Gmail account just to access Buzz?

What I hope it will become

1) A mainstream social network aggregator
If I could quickly add stuff from ALL my social networks and then push updates to them via Buzz it would be killer.

2) Central to Googles social strategy
How you interact with people via Google services is incredibly fractured – there’s Gmail, Google Chat and messaging in other sites such as Youtube (not to mention Google “overhyped and soon to be a flop” Wave). There are widgets that let you integrate one service into another (such as chat into Gmail), but these are mainly just tagged on. Buzz could really help pull these together.

Overall I like Buzz, but until it allows me to interact with all my friends (not just those on Gmail) I don’t think I’ll be using it.