eMarketing Trends|Verbal Acrobatics & Graphic Gymnastics

Google Wave is very innovative and at the lead of cutting edge social media technology. It was launched in late September 2009. Many people might say that it is technically superior to its closest competitors, Twitter, Facebook, and Flicker but it has been slow in gaining significant market share. Basically Google wave is an online tool for real time communication and collaboration.  ICT Practitioner, Aleshia Thompson says the only difference  of Google wave from other social media is that when the user is typing on their computer the receiver at the other end can see it word for word immediately-as they type in real time.

The Wave has many exciting uses. It can be used for organizing events, group projects, photo sharing, meeting notes, brainstorming and interactive games. People can work together even if they are geographically far apart.  They can edit each other’s work in real time on one document using different computers in different locations.  The wave can connect different social media platforms. An update on Wave can also simultaneously appear on Twitter and Facebook. One can also video chat on Wave. The most distinctive feature about wave is the translation tool. If you send a message in English but your contact prefers French it will appear in French one their computer. Your contacts French response will appear in English on your computer.

The Google is very versatile and its featured extensions are:

• lab Pixies,
• Ribbit
• 6 rounds
• lonely planet
• Accu Weather and
• Google maps

However this state of the art system has its flaws.  Most new users have cited the fact that you are only able to use this new technology if you’ve received an invitation; this means Google Wave is not yet used by the mainstream users. Speed and security has also been mentioned as some of the biggest draw backs to the system. Many users say Wave is sometimes slow, and that they don’t have anybody to chat with because their contacts don’t have invites yet. Many speculators believe that the reason why Google wave has been slow to gain market share is because of the invitations.

The security fear far outweighs the two above.  Toronto SEO expert Allan Pollet said “One thing that greatly concerns me is the fact that these waves are an ongoing conversation, it is disturbing because they are conversations, which is recorded in fine detail.” “Every edit, correction, deletion, addition, mistyping is saved and can be played back by everyone who shares in the wave. “My concern is also with the fact that there is no obvious delete button. Yes you can un-follow a wave but when you do it is still live on other people’s computers.”

One can easily see why Google named this innovative product “Wave” because it is quite literally the next wave in communications. No more waiting, the future is here with Google Wave. Many companies small or big are likely to ride the Google Wave once it becomes mainstream.  Safety issues aside, the general public is likely going to find the interconnectivity of Wave too hard to resist.  Other social media platforms are going to have to become very creative to compete with “Wave” in the future.