iGoogle: Google's social platform

Thu 13 August 2009 10:03, Bas van den Beld

Google has never been very succesfull in the social media area. Orkut never really made it, except for in countries like Brazil and India and the acquisition of Jaiku can be called a disaster if you look at the current success of Twitter.

However there are some tools Google owns that are very social, though not many may think of it that way. But blogging tool Blogger, Image software tool Picasa, Feedburner, YouTube and FriendConnect all are social tools. Another one is iGoogle. And that last one just might be Googles gateway to a succesful social presence. Starting this week Google is rolling out new gadgets on iGoogle, sadly enough for now only in the US.

Still its interesting to see what Google is doing on iGoogle. Google's aim is to get users to interact via iGoogle: play games, share content and collaborate with friends.

There are some fun and interesting ones like GoComics, Social Photos and the New York Times Crossword. Through code.google.com/igoogle developers can also make their own gadgets. At www.google.com/igsocial you can find a full list of the social gadgets.

Next to the social gadgets Google als introduces two new features called a "Friends group" and "Updates". With Friends Group, users can create their own liist of friends based on Goggle contacts with whom they can interact through the social gadgets. "Updates" is a familiar one. Users can see what their friends are up to. Kind of like the status-updates on Facebook or Twitter.

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Comments (4)

- Dennis Sievers
- [website]
Facebook, Yahoo, Bing, Twitter, Friendfeed. They slowly unveil their offensive tactics to crack Google's position in the market. Google must be feeling the heat, as they also seem to be getting into social now.

Although iGoogle truly is not my cup of tea, the curtain slowly goes down and we can start to see where the market is going: a user based environment where everything can be done:

- keep in contact with friends
- share information, photos, games, tips, etc. with everybody who wants to know
- search for information you need
- have a personal homepage
- work on documents, sheets
- be able to email and chat
- etc.

The funny part though, is that Google and Yahoo/Bing are coming from the opposite direction than Facebook, Friendfeed and Twitter. Where Google and Yahoo/Bing are coming from the search side, the others come from the Social side. Nonetheless, the ideal user-binding situation is when both sides come together. With Google introducing iGoogle Social, they surely take a new step in the right direction.

I wonder though, if Google can alter their image quick and good enough to become a social media player.

Thu 13 Aug 2009, 10:31
- rosamel campos araya
excelente para jugar y comunicarse.gracias

Fri 14 Aug 2009, 16:04
- rosamel campos araya
excelente para jugar y comunicarse.gracias

Fri 14 Aug 2009, 16:05
- r4 card
- [website]
I wonder though, why does google have 2 Social media?....both orkut and igoogle.... I love orkut. But my friends are spending more time on face book. So Iv got no choice but to move.

Fri 16 Oct 2009, 08:11

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