Buzz Kill
| Sunday, 22 August 2010, 1:06 am Tags: Blogging, buzz, Google, social media |
Something happened tonight that made me question everything I’ve done with social media since I first joined Twitter in late 2006.
You know me – I’m a complete web whore. I sign up for every site, try every web app, use every service I can find. It’s my job, but I also love doing it. I believe in the Internet as a communication tool. I love trying the myriad new ways people are using it to connect and I believed that social media specifically had some magic new potential to bring us together.
When Google announced Buzz last year I was one of the first to jump on the bandwagon. I welcomed a competitor to Twitter that had the community features I loved in Friendfeed and Jaiku, and I thought Google had the best chance to create a second generation social network. I defended Google for its initial privacy stumbles and I began to use Buzz exclusively, replacing Twitter, Friendfeed, and Facebook. I built a following of over 17,000 people. I was happy.
Then last night I noticed that my Buzzes were no longer showing up on Twitter (I use a service called Buzz Can Tweet that has been pretty reliably rebroadcasting my Buzz posts to Twitter.) I looked more closely at my Buzz feed and noticed that there had been considerably less engagement over the past few weeks. Then I noticed that I wasn’t seeing my posts in my Buzz timeline at all. A little deeper investigation showed that nothing I had posted on Buzz had gone public since August 6. Nothing. Fifteen posts buried, including show notes from a week’s worth of TWiT podcasts.
Maybe I did something wrong to my Google settings. Maybe I flipped some obscure switch. I am completely willing to take the blame here. But I am also taking away a hugely important lesson.
Not even me.
It makes me feel like everything I’ve posted over the past four years on Twitter, Jaiku, Friendfeed, Plurk, Pownce, and, yes, Google Buzz, has been an immense waste of time. I was shouting into a vast echo chamber where no one could hear me because they were too busy shouting themselves. All this time I’ve been pumping content into the void like some chatterbox Onan. How humiliating. How demoralizing.
Thank God the content I deem most important, my Internet and broadcast radio shows, still stand. I believe in what I’m doing there, and have been very fortunate to have found an audience. I’m pretty sure I would have heard from people if there had been 16 days of dead silence there. Hell, if we miss one show I get hundreds of emails. But I feel like I’ve woken up to a bad social media dream in terms of the content I’ve put in others’ hands. It’s been lost, and apparently no one was even paying attention to it in the first place.
I should have been posting it here all along. Had I been doing so I’d have something to show for it. A record of my life for the last few years at the very least. But I ignored my blog and ran off with the sexy, shiny microblogs. Well no more. I’m sorry for having neglected you Leoville. From now on when I post a picture of a particularly delicious sandwich I’m posting it here. When I complain that Sookie is back with Bill, you’ll hear it here first. And the show notes for my shows will go here, too.
Social media, I gave you the best years of my life, but never again. I know where I am wanted. Screw you Google Buzz. You broke my heart.
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Comments
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Swag
Its a shame cause I really LOVE Google buzz and think buzz does everything better then twitter but even as I think that I still mostly turn to twitter and differently better then facebook, which i hate with a passion but still use since everyone and their mothers seems to be addicted to. I don't understand how or why google seems not to be able to capture everyones attention with their products. In any case, I hope the rumored "google me" kills off facebook.
RT Bye-bye Google Buzz... tr.im/idal
Is it the time when social media euphoria is going to burst yet?
I won't go this far but lately I've been going back to old-school media: blogs, RSS, and (gasp) books.
RT @sambaroug
ソーシャルメディアは
RT @leolaport
If you don't read the comments, this post by Leo Laporte is awesome...
I think people who rely on mainly mobile for there net usage benefit the most from Twitter. I enjoy following people who can provide me with liks to new information (via websites) ... the rest is plain boring. For example, i like to follow Leo, but when he posts about being Mayor of whatever or takes a picture of his dinner, I really don't care.
Buzz Kill
Buzz Kill
Leo. You are a super hero. I was just using your sites and business model as an example to a client the other day and I did notice your blogs were a bit slim.
Buzz Kill I get the same feeling. Nobody is listening.
Leo Laporte's broken tubes and heart I miss books. I can generally find a better book than an article on Twitter.
Leo, I hear you... just not sure I agree with you. Here's why:
Continuing the TV parallel that Eric drew below... We miss our favorite TV shows because we know when they're going to be on and when they're not there, we notice.
Social exchanges on the other hand, are like phone calls from a friend. If they never call you, you never miss it because you weren't expecting it.
Giving up on social for the sake of the blog is like giving up on advertising for the sake of the show. Both should support the other. Write the show notes on the blog, its the perfect forum for long form content. Then use social to alert your followers that its available on the blog and link them back.
And if the concern in losing the short form content you create via various social channels, there are plenty of tools to gather up all that chatter and publish a digest version (daily, weekly, whatever) to the blog.
Anyway, that's my 2 cents worth!
JT
Buzz Kill ='(
RT @leolaport
great article RT @spatially
“@leolapor
Bye-bye Google Buzz ...Buzz Kill
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If you don't read the comments, this post by Leo Laporte is awesome. I think he's spot on. - (via @chrisbrog
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bye buzz hello ijustine
@chrisbrog
@chrisbrog
I agree with everthing Leo has said... but ironacly I found out about this through Robert Scobles Google Buzz
I dont think this is the first time that Leo's posts have not shown, back in June/July I made a comment on my Buzz that Leo had not posted something for a while.
Social media is amazing but needs to be balanced with the rest of life...The Leo Laporte blog makes you think.
RT @chrisbrog
Great post by @LeoLaport