Google will make sharing actually seem like sharing.

The problem with Facebook is for a social network that swears its business by the generosity of its members sharing things, Facebook is stingy. If you haven’t read my A Sad Decentralized Social Network and Loïc Le Meur’s My Social Map is Totally Decentralized but I Want It Back On My Blog, you’d see the importance of having your activities back where you want them. It’s the place where you live, the place you call home. Home-Sweet-Home-Page. Also known as your personal blog.

All bloggers would understand this. If you think about it, it is funny. You share your status updates using twitter, you share using Facebook. But blogger’s true personal profile should be on his personal site, not in a social network. The person’s membership to social network is a lot like a person’s membership to any group. If you are a member of your high school’s dance club, you know what I mean. Aside from the after practice pizza and occasional movie hangout, what you get is another set of friends–a.k.a. social network.

And just as what your parents have been telling you, you don’t befriend people just to become someone else. You are who you are. You becomes friends with people you have similar interests with. In a manner of speaking, Facebook is trying to define who we are by the limitations it’s own philosophies has set on itself. And we’ve seen this happen many times in the past. FB is trying to be better, sure. But what I don’t understand is, as it moves towards a certain direction, why must everyone else be dragged along with it.

For example, if I wanted to use a certain FB app, I would. Once FB decides to change some of its policies–it may be for the best, I’m sure, but who cares–if it breaks the connection with the app I wanna use. It made a decision apart from me that affects me. A very good example of this is every time FB updates their API, it breaks the connection with Flock. Flock is awesome! It makes surfing the web and socializing a breeze. And it’s been reaching out to FB since the day it started. But every single time they solve the code, FB changes again and the Flock team needs to run amok, rearrange themselves, just to best be able to fix things. It has been so bad, Flock Development Team decided to stop updating the code for the chat system that’s supposed to sit in your browser and accompany you where ever you surf. Their reason is FB changes the code for their chat so often it’s not funny, they’ll need a full time department just to be able to make both ends meet if they continue developing for it. Images from Walt Disney’s Chicken Little come to mind.

Skip to 7:30 to see what I mean.

This would never happen on my website. Because here I am the boss. If there is an app that I want to use, I’ll use it. If I install a plugin that breaks the connection, I’ll be the one to choose which one is more important, the app or the plugin. And that’s just talking about membership. Once you are member of FB, where do you view all your updates? In Facebook. Where there are Facebook ads side by side your own updates.

Not only is Facebook asking you to be a member of their social network and defining you. It’s asking you to leave your home, for-go your mailbox, go to the local community center to associate with everyone in the network so that you could see the advertisements on their site and earn them money. Bad. Bad. Bad.

Facebook is a bit of a prick!!!

What happens when you want to view your updates from a different website? Well, Facebook used to allow users to do this. They had RSS updates of Newsfeeds that could be sent and embedded into any website. It used to work nicely. Today though, the only updates you’d see would be “David updated his status,” and only if you click on it would you be brought to FB to see what David updated his status to. Bad. Bad. Bad.

I spent close to a month looking for and trying out the best set up to have all my online activities back to my site. FB was especially hard to set up. (I started with profilactic. But I quickly switched to FriendFeed because what profilactic’s etymology.)

Another horrible thing is whenever my friends or myself share a link from my blog. It would receive at least a handful of comments on Facebook, but my blog’s comments remain empty. Is there a way to re-import your stuff back from FB? Yes. But it is not easy. Definitely not as easy as how Google wants to do it.

Google Buzz will change all of this. Google has said often that it’s main business is the search engine and the small inconspicuous ads posted on search results. Everything else they’ve done are hobbies. That includes the online docs and spreadsheets that gives Microsoft’s Office a run for its money. Then there is Gmail and countless other things. All these products are simply handcrafted by Google to encourage users to use the internet more. That’s it. That’s generosity.

Google is Generous!

Watch the introduction to Google Wave. It is a bit long, but it shows Google’s idea of what a bright future would be for the Internet and everyone using it.

If you notice, it’s all about sharing. Unlike Facebook, you don’t have to share under Facebook’s terms and do it in their site. You could do it in yours. Why is this the future? Eventually, just as we are no longer confined by physical space, we won’t be confined by which website you are in. You should get your info and share your info. This goes against Facebook’s philosophies almost completely. They’ll need more than a profile update to withstand this wave.

Once this is implemented, Wave, I’ll be happy to have all the updates in my Gmail back in my website instantly.

In other words, Google Buzz (and Wave together) is about to bring our personalities back to people. No longer would an institution overlord it’s philosophies and ideals to the masses. Users would get to fashion themselves the way they want. It’s very similar to the industrial revolution in France and what better way to prove what I mean by showing a personal favorite song of mine that shows human triumph over oppression.

Cool huh?

The problem is Google with all its benevolence, is a bit of a boyscout. Just like Clark Kent/Superman, it is getting a little bit annoying to watch a superstar like Google play meek all the time. Cuz let’s be honest, Google is big. Facebook, even with what is has accomplished, is small compared to Google. Google is ubiquitous. When it comes to safe guarding my personal stuff, I trust no one else but Google. But Google won’t over take Facebook and the other sites overnight, not a week, fortnight, month, not even a year. It’s gonna start slow. Teach people to use and get comfortable with their products. Then before you know it, they are everywhere.

The only power-play Google has obviously got is embedding Buzz inside Gmail. That means a couple of things.

1. Gmail users are automatic Buzz users, no sign ups necessary.
2. Gmail users will be able to see Buzz updates every time they check they emails.
3. The 1.3 billion Chinese in China will have an alternative that is unlikely to be blocked by their government despite the qualms between the institutions. Blocking Gmail is more ethically wrong than blocking a social network.

But that’s a whole new story altogether. Maybe I’ll write about it in the future. In the mean time I’ll wait for Google to takeover so I could have all the conveniences they promise.