Google Wave: Google Tries to Reinvent Email
Google today announced a new Internet-based communications and collaboration platform; Google Wave. While some of the details are still a bit sketchy, Google Wave looks to be an integrated communications platform that brings together email, chat, photo-sharing, and collaborative editing features. Google describes a 'wave' as "equal parts conversation and document" and the Wave team basically sees it as a replacement for email and other collaboration tools.
Reinventing Email for the 21st Century
Users will be able to create 'waves,' and add documents and collaborators to it. The system will feature concurrent rich-text editing, as well as email and IM-like messaging functions. Lars Rasmussen, one of the co-founders and lead engineers behind this project, especially stressed the real-time nature of Wave, where edits to a wave, be they new messages or edits in a document, appear immediately on the screens of all participants.
From what we have seen, Wave combines aspects of productivity tools, social networks, and micro-blogging. One of the most interesting features is that every change to a wave is captured and users can 'replay' how the specific wave developed over time. Wave will allow users to send private and public messages, and Google is heavily relying on HTML5 to make the product work well in modern browsers. We will have a more detailed look at all the features of Wave once we get access to the product itself.
Developers, Developers, Developers
Google is also making a set of APIs available to developers today. These APIs should give developers the ability to enhance Wave by building extensions for the core product, but also to embed Wave's features on other sites to make them more collaborative. One extension Google offers today, for those lucky enough to have access to Wave already, is a Twitter extension, and Google will also offer the ability to integrate OpenSocial gadgets into Wave.
Interestingly, Google is taking a very open approach with this new product. Not only will it give developers access to Wave's APIs, but the team also plans to open-source the protocols at the core of Wave, which really points at the greater ambition of the Wave team to see Wave and its protocols replace at least some of today's standard communications systems.
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sometimes I get down on google - and stuff like this reminds me why I stick with 'em. this longer term thinking about how personal technology can and should be different. why is "email" the go-to for communication? we share in real-time and use lots of media and collaborate - the wave sounds cool. but probably very far from being widely used.
This really isn't email reinvented, I don't think - but it does redefine social technology, from IM through social networking through presence. It's distributed, open and extensible, which has the potential (we'll see what happens) to form a robust backbone for social communication. Whether Wave succeeds or not, this is the model for the future.
Looks really cool, and powerful. But one thing I'd like to see is an "Easy Button" [Staples]. So I can optionally dumb it down for times where I'd like to just send a message - fast. Or, for my non-techie dad.
I realize that defeats the purpose, but if Google is planning on replacing their email interface with this, it'd be nice to have options.
Makes a hell of a lot of sense, especially as an open platform play.
My simple net out is that this is a model that deals elegantly with both messages and payloads, where the payloads could be pics, videos, posts, songs, maps, people/product/business listings, etc.
As such, there is a lot of value in how the handling layer processes these messages/payloads, enabling them to be aggregated and/or filtered into logical constructs, like NOW, LOCAL, TYPE, POPULAR, VIRAL, ENGAGING, etc.
I blogged about an application model that is very complimentary to this (and for which I have modeled out six very specific use cases) in a post called:
âRight Here Nowâ services: weaving a real-time web around status
http://bit.ly/i40h
Check it out if interested.
Mark
Im looking forward to this google wave can be better than twitter and all the others
Great points about the developers Frederic. It's all about the prosumer cloud...
Does anyone else find it convenient that the Wave announcement came on the same day as Microsoft's Bing release? Seems like a big PR FU to Msoft by the Googly Goog:
http://socialnode.blogspot.com/2009/05/googles-wave-overshadows-microsofts.html
A functional Wave app will certainly mean more for search data and function than Microsoft's incremental search advance.
"You've got a wave!" - pretty cool. Looks like google is still setting trends, bing it or not. The only problem I see here is that the wave may turn into a drain for some computers. Application like this can definitely take up a lot of resources.
Web-based Outlook on steroids.
Important and exciting to note also that the underlying transport for federated Wave is the open source XMPP (Jabber) protocol which powers Google Talk, and a multitude of other Jabber servers and clients for IM, presence, multi-user chat, and lots of other interesting uses.
This is a huge win for the XMPP community since they will presumably be able to interoperate with Wave and use the same 'user@domain.com' addressing shared by XMPP and email alike (JID in XMPP speak).
This is pretty a pretty ambitious and audacious plan that only a company of Google's depth could have a chance in hell of pulling off.
Woot! Wave.
can't wait.
It looks very nice. Typical google ;) i will use it for my website www.nge.ch i hope this is something better than the ie and other stuff...
It's more than email.
Sounds powerful! I'm definitely excited and I can't wait. This would be a great tool for me and my friends as we are always having conversations using email. I like how we can reply to any part of the conversation by 'splitting' it apart. Love that Google is always coming out with cutting edge applications!
Google's again step ahead of concurrent giant - MS with its Vine ))
And it's not some e-mail revolution - seems more like re-shaping all the world net configuration, taking into account XMPP-based communication and phrase about "new protocols".
Great invention. I want to participate in re-shaping the future ))
This is a really cool announcement. On the same day as Bing as well.
When you look at both announcements, it really shows how Goog and MS think at the very basic level.
I think their thinking is structured by their first products - OS company vs. Search company.
Blogged on the same topic at http://bit.ly/8g1qX
I do not have any very good question
Are normal people able to cope with so much information?
Are normal people capable to handle this more complex application?
Nice looking app, looking forward to using it!
Shame about the constant clapping, bloody irritating.
Awesome application. To me, it could definitely revolutionize our approach to web communications. Could be the twitter-killer!
Fact that it'll be open source is really interesting as to development and integration into websites.
Google Wave reprents the futur of (real-time) web.
Twitter was a first step ... Wave is a BIG step.
About Twitter, do you know that we are near to reach the 2 billionth message ?
http://www.tweespeed.com gives the "instant twitter speed" and tries to give an aproximative reach date for the 2 billionth tweet.
Amazing !!
The interface looks simple and this is key to its success. can't wait to get started
those who say this will drain a computers resources are wrong. all the calculation and grunt work are done on google servers, thats the whole point of a server centralized system...its like saying that google search won't work because searching the web will max out our computers, when obviously that is done on google servers as well.
Go google! Interface and functionality looks great. If they get it right and with the open API approach, this tool could provide one centralised point for all collaboration. In the current segmented environment this could be a great thing.
maps, search, analytics are really impressive. This is kind of so what. There is nothing revolutionary here at all!! It is more like a live spelling and grammer checker. I suppose like M$, it is as much about the concept as it is about the implementation. Google always seem one step ahead of M$.
I'm interested to know if Google Waves are going to eliminate spam from the ground up, or will we still receive Viagra spam Waves?
Also will one be able to add participants to a Wave and restrict what they can do to the Wave? For instance, Waves could replace blog entries and only some participants would be able to edit it, whilst others would be able to comment on it, others only able to read it, and still others not be able to even know it is there.
What about sending Waves to a huge list of subscribers, like mailing lists?
If Waves are truly to replace email as we know it today, I'd like to know how these functions are going to be addressed.
It's an exciting concept that the Google Wave team has presented and it would be wonderful to have a truly innovative upgrade to email. This product is long overdue. I hope it does all it seems to promise to do.
What I want from it is a giant leap forward in productivity and an end to time lost on spam and other inbox clutter.
One fundamental question above all technical implementation: How is the Mental Load of a common user?
As far as I can see from demo video, Wave integrates IM, mail, wiki, docs, blog, map, search, photos, (and hopefully) audio & video ... into ONE app, that the Aggregated Complexity might challenge a common user's IQ, and inevitably creates frustration (http://www.billbuxton.com/LessIsMore.html).
Moreover, everything on the UI seems active & dynamic enough, the only thing lack here is CERTAINTY (You have no idea where the Wave goes after a blink). And too bad those shiny features are just counter-productive to me:
A. Imagine editing a serious document, you need to think before typing anything. With insertions and deletes here and there by your buddies all the time, which are nothing but distractions, I doubt you can deliver a satisfactory result in the end.
B. Or imagine a popular blog post that attracts hundreds of commenters, everyone can post anything anywhere in the post, and other can follow right on spot, or before it, or after it, or try to correct the original, or try to reference others' comments, with photos, links, and possibly videos inserted everywhere across the post, with indicators here and there showing the online status of all commenters ... the entire post would become totally unreadable in the end.
Of course for the above 2 scenarios, buttons/options can be placed somewhere for user to lock current view or hide all comments. And that's the where the irony is: introduce more features to resolve the mess caused by too many features ...
IMHO, I believe Wave is a fantastic vehicle to carry cool new concepts, ideas or features, and will breed tons of app innovations for sure. But Wave as an end user app as shown in the video still has a long way to go before widespread acceptance.
Simply put, if end users don't "get it", it won't boom.
Eheh. Google is developing itself. If we live, Google sends a search satellite to space :)
Thinking of Wave in terms of "replacing" such as GMAIL (or even email, itself) is just silly. Not every Internet communication needs to be (or even should be) as would be in Wave. Traditional email, at the very least, should (and likely will) never go away. Of this, I think there should be little fear or doubt.
Now, that doesn't mean there won't be a place -- and a potent one, indeed -- in our lives for such as Wave and its ineluctable variants. It, too, will be useful, under the right circumstances. In fact, from my admittedly only-cursory analysis of it to date, I'm thinking that what actually MAY be "replaced" by Wave, as a practical matter, is traditional "chat," as we now know it (though traditional chat, mark my words, will continue to be around for years and years, too, no matter how good Wave ultimately gets).
Regardless, one thing about which we should all be clear in our minds is that we're not talking about the mere replacing of anything, here. Wave, for better or worse, seems very nearly of the nature of paradigm shift... and far be it from me to suggest that that's, necessarily, a bad thing, here.
It does, however, come with pitfalls about which we should all be watchful, if not actually downright concerned. For example, though it's now coming out in articles (and/or rebuttals to such as I am posting here) that it's likely to be user-configurable, initial writings about Wave touted the ability (and represented it as essential to Wave's very way of operating) of all persons in a "wave" (or a thread) to be able to see, in real time, all others' keystrokes, as they type.
Let me repeat the salient words of that, here: AS. THEY. TYPE.
Think about that, please, for just a moment. It's a far larger problem than, perhaps, it initially seems. Like how sausage is made (or, as some joke, like how laws are passed), some things in life may better be left something of a mystery to those who ultimately consume (or are regulated by) them; and, most importantly, solely at the creator's option.
The ultimate impact and meaning to the reader of anything written would be inordinately influenced by said reader's having been a witness to its creation. If one is a thoughtful writer who doesn't just blurt out every wayward thing which flits through one's brain, then one is going to pause to think while one types, and back-up and delete and re-type, and whatever else behind-the-scenes activity goes into what ends-up being the finished written product. If the reader were able to witness what the writer merely paused before writing; or actually did write, but then thought better of and either removed or changed to something else, then the bell of what the reader saw along the way cannot be un-rung; and the reader's ultimate interpretation and understanding of the final written result will be indelibly affected in ways (even if not immediately obvious) more likely than not to be inherently bad for all concerned.
Now, if it's true, as some who challenge such as my assertions, here, are now saying, that the ability of others to view one's keystrokes as one makes them is (or at least will be) user-configurable in the version of Wave which is finally released to the end-user wild, then my concern, at least on this particular privacy-related point, is happily ameliorated.
However, of larger philosophical concern to me is that the creators of Wave apparently believed, even if only briefly, that something as basic as this issue would not be important. What, then (if anything), does that mean we should also be wary of in the realm of personal privacy protections, just generally, for users of this new and groundbreaking product? For what else should we be watching which may, ultimately, negatively impact us because of fundamental, and at least initially seemingly harmless, privacy encroachments...
...encroachments which may not even be recognizable as encroachments to Wave's creators because, perhaps, of their nationality and upbringing (nothing negative, mind you, intended by that wording, I assure).
One potentially troubling impact (at least from the standpoint of Americans, in my opinion) of globalization (which, incidentaly, I'm not fundamentally against, despite how what I'm about to write may make it seem) is how the sensibilities of those non-Americans who create things which all others on the planet end-up using can unintentionally contravene that which Americans hold perhaps nearer and dearer to their hearts than do non-American others. Those who grew up and still live in countries where such things as privacy and freedom of speech are not as absolute and paramount as in the US may or may not necessarily value such rights to the same degree as do Americans; and it sometimes shows in their work.
It has not escaped my notice that the two brothers -- brilliant though they are -- who created and continue to develop Wave were neither born and raised in, nor now live in, the US... and so I fear (and I may be completely wrong about this, I realize... but absent, at this point, any reason not to, I am nevertheless fearing that they) may not place as much of a premium on the notion of absolute privacy (if desired by the end-user of Wave) as do Americans.
Or, who knows, maybe they do. I don't know them, and it's unfair of me to presume, I suppose (or even to suppose, I presume). One way or the other, though, it should be at least a concern to all that the default behavior of Wave seems so inherently and joltingly privacy-denuding.
So, then, again, begged is the question: Of what else (if anything), in Wave, should we who hold inviolate our privacy be wary?
To appeal to (at least thinking) Americans, the makers of Wave need to take steps to ensure that if the end-user wants to protect his/her absolute privacy while using this admittedly exciting and paradigm-shifting new product, it can, via easy configuration settings, be satisfactorily and incontrovertibly achieved at all possible levels, and in all possible ways. Moreover, as it is developed, the makers of Wave might need to realize that they may, because of their nationality and upbringing, not necessarily even recognize what all of those levels and ways might be; and the Americans (or even the non-Americans who at least fully grasp the American viewpoint regarding all this) who work on the development of Wave should ensure that no privacy holes such as I'm discussing here remain anywhere in it when it's finally and fully released into the end-user wild.
Or so it is my opinion... my two cents worth, as it were...
...which my ex-wife, for example, among others, has been known to quickly attest tends to be about all it's usually worth.
__________________________
Gregg L. DesElms
Napa, California
gregg[at]greggdeselms.com
Richard: When you view the power of Google's spell checker, and how it's able to read for context in real time you can see how much more protected a wave is against spam than SMTP traffic is. The extensibility of the wave via participating robots makes the possibilities of what one can do with a wave nearly endless. And mind you, you don't "send a wave," you invite participants into the wave. This is a very key, and important difference to how they function as compared to email or IM.
Posted by: guruvan (Rob Nelson)
|
June 2, 2009 4:06 PM
I want to know, if you can use any email address in the wave system?
Thanks
@Gregg:
I think you're right, Wave as far as we see can be a better (multi-user) chat tool. Nearly all IM apps today have some kind of chatting history log, usually indexed by contact person and hardly any topic at all.
At least Wave can be a much better chat manager. And the anology can be applied to mail as well, and blur the boundary between chat vs. mail.
Hi,
We have an abstract here about the video and possibilities on Google wave:
http://www.gestionconsult.es/blog/resumen-de-google-wave/
Now, if it's true, as some who challenge such as my assertions, here, are now saying, that the ability of others to view one's keystrokes as one makes them is (or at least will be) user-configurable in the version of Wave which is finally released to the end-user wild,
Now, if it's true, as some who challenge such as my assertions, here, are now saying, that the ability of others
Google wave looks cool , Hay i can across a similar exciting web collaboration and communication site colayer.com
both look very similar.Colayer has almost all the features shown in googls video! wow thats also cool.
I have seen colayer exactly on the similar line as WAVE. Guys you must check this link too.
if the wave google come in the website please inform me. because this is very gobalisation website. i like it
hmm... Colayer too is cool web app, instead a good collaborative and contextual communicative 'PLATFORM'.
....waiting to explore similarities between Wave and Colayer after wave release.
Yep, google demos look cool. Especially the co-editing & drag & drop feature. But the core concept 'Contextualization' is same as that of Colayer.
http://www.koxpturkey.com
Thanxx
Yeh ,is Google wave something like Colayer...?
Sounds great. I definitely can't wait to try this out. Go Google!!
hi.........
Thanks...........
Google, a big site. But opponents output: Bingo
Why are my deleted messages? :(
those who say this will drain a computers resources are wrong. all the calculation and grunt work are done on google servers, thats the whole point of a server centralized system...its like saying that google search won't work because searching the web will max out our computers, when obviously that is done on google servers as well.
Google wave looks cool , Hay i can across a similar exciting web collaboration and communication site colayer.com
both look very similar.Colayer has almost all the features shown in googls video! wow thats also cool.
hmm... Colayer too is cool web app, instead a good collaborative and contextual communicative 'PLATFORM'.
....waiting to explore similarities between Wave and Colayer after wave release.
thanks
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