Google Wave makes my head hurt
October 20, 2009
After using Google Wave’s preview with some friends, I am left with mixed feelings and a dull ache in my brain. Google Wave, Google’s new collaborative messaging tool is meant to bridge the gap between email and instant messaging by allowing real-time “waves” to be hosted and contributed to in realtime by participants. Participants can add standard text comments/messages or include images and files via drag and drop. Participants can also add various Google Widgets and dynamic content like Google Maps, Wiki definitions on the fly, video conferencing and more.
I’ve been at it for a few weeks and while I’m impressed with the technology at hand, I’m not sure it makes collaborating any easier. Adding dynamic content via Widgets and/or Wavebots is hit or miss since Wave and widget developers are still ironing out the kinks. Conversations between numerous people still becomes confusing… and conversations that include utter strangers can be a bit daunting since every word you type is transmitted in real-time. It made me a little hesitant to interact- fearing my typing inaccuracies would be blatantly obvious.
I’m also not too keen on having to go to googlewave.com and have an entirely separate interface for waves.. I hope there’s a hook into gmail eventually, which I believe is where waves should live. I think waves should be utilized on a smaller level… perhaps used to wave about files shared in an email or a way to markup and discuss photos or other media with a link inside your email to the wave. Having full-on conversations with numerous participants at this point makes eyes go fuzzy.
The product is still in early preview and while I see the merit of sharing images and other media on waves versus emails and the ability to collaborate in real-time, I’m not sure it is actually any easier to collaborate.
