Google Buzz - WTF?

I have a Google Mail account, principally because it was the easiest way to set up an account with Google (for things like Google Maps APIs and a few webmaster tools).  I noticed a bit of a buzz on the interweb, but hadn't really looked into it (I normally use Evolution to access my gmail account via IMAP).

I was more than a little surprised to find that I'd been signed up for Buzz by default.  Fortunately I only had two contacts, because I rarely use gmail except as a mail drop for subscriptions, and I hadn't set up a public profile, so there was rather little impact.  I've now turned it off (via the little letters at the bottom of the gmail screen).  For others however, their contacts have been spread around as followers, and their mailboxes receive additional and frequently unwanted input.

The Register noted the swelling privacy objections (Google Buzz leaves privacy concerns ringing in ears):

And so it has come to pass - Mountain View’s sinister personal data grab has finally crept into the most sacred of all online communication tools. Gmail now has the ability to do social networking.

Google wants to out-Facebook Facebook, out-Twitter Twitter and out-Internet Explorer Internet Explorer and so and so and so, infinitum. But the ad broker’s relentless efforts to carpetbomb the entire interwebulator with its brand is becoming at best tiresome and at worst downright creepy.

The Register article is quite explicit about where the problems with Buzz lie - in the enforced Web 2.0 changes imposed on many people. A number of commentators have remarked on the privacy issues.  Molly Wood at CNET remarks (Google Buzz: Privacy nightmare):

I love the idea of neat new tech innovations that lead to streamlined communication, real-time updating, in-line video and photo posting, and supersimple friend and contact integration. I do not, however, like a product that bursts through my door like a tornado and opts me in to wanton in-box clutter and spam (or, more precisely, bacn) publicly reveals my personal contact list without asking me, threatens to broadcast my e-mail address anytime someone wants to @ me in a Buzz, and even appears to grab photos off my Android phone that I've never uploaded.

That, right there, is bad behavior, and given all the hue and cry about Facebook's inexorable attempts to expose everything about its users to the entire world, Google ought to know better.

A work colleague found pictures from his phone automatically uploaded to the web.  Another colleague (having thought they'd opted out by clicking an option to go straight to gmail rather than Buzz) emailed me to say:

I was automatically signed up to Google Buzz.  Tending towards paranoid myself, I had a quick look online (searching via Google of course) to see what the buzz is about Buzz.  It’s despicable that Google has signed up users without explaining explicitly what “it” is, or even confirming that they have done so.  I am incensed that, having clicked “Nah, take me to my inbox” they have assumed that means “I consent to this new service, about which I know nothing”.

It would appear that Google have been taking steps to ameliorate the effects of this potential privacy disaster, but not quickly or effectively enough.  Here's an example of what can happen (and reports of stalkers abound): F***you Google (there is strong language there, but entirely justified).

Here's my view. 

Email is email.  People sign up for an email service to send emails with a degree of privacy about the content and recipients, and they generally have a mixture of professional and personal contacts.  Often they wish contacts not to know about each other, for a variety of reasons.  An email account is different from a social activity like Twitter or Facebook or Posterous, and any major functional change such as Buzz ought at the very least be opt-in rather than opt-out.

Many educational outfits are using Google Apps to provide cloud software and email - apparently these users will have Buzz rolled out in the next couple of months.  I posted a negative comment to add to the gushing impatient ones at this official Google blog article (Google Buzz coming soon for businesses and schools),but as yet the moderators hadn't passed it. Ho hum.