Google’s failed social service Buzz was officially killed in 2011, but the company is now taking its final steps to phase out the service – It has notified former users of the service that the Buzz data still exists and will be shifted to Drive accounts by July.
Google says the data will not be counted against users’ Drive storage limit. If a user chooses not to delete the Public Buzz posts, they “may appear in search results and on your Google Profile.”
For those who don’t remember Google Buzz, it was the company’s first attempt in the social networking segment, one that was to take on the likes of Twitter and Facebook.
Google Buzz featured elements from Facebook and Twitter but remained just a tab within Gmail. The service was aimed at encouraging users to share quick updates with their friends and contacts in Gmail.
However, Buzz was hit by spate of controversies, including privacy concerns. The service’s auto-follow and subscribe feature drew flak from all corners. The product never caught on with users with Facebook and Twitter continuing to dominate in the social networking segment.
Google once again attempted at the social networking segment with the launch of Google in June 2011. The service, unlike Google Buzz, saw more success and currently has over 190 million active users. Google ‘s success, however, is also driven by its deep integration with other popular Google products such as YouTube and Gmail. In the meanwhile, check out below the e-mail sent by Google to former Buzz users:
In October 2011 we announced Google Buzz was shutting down. On or after July 17th, 2013, Google will take the last step in the shutdown and will save a copy of your Buzz posts to your Google Drive, a service for storing files online. Google will store two (2) types of files to your Google Drive, and the newly-created files will not count against your storage limits. If you’d like to wipe Buzz from your online world completelly, go here and delete the data now: https://profiles.google.com/me/deletebuzz
1. The first type of file will be private, only accessible to you, containing a snapshot of the Google Buzz public and private posts you authored.
2. The second type of file will contain a copy of only your Google Buzz public posts. By default it will be viewable by anyone with the link, and may appear in search results and on your Google Profile (if you’ve linked to your Buzz posts). Note, any existing links to your Google Buzz content will redirect users to this file.
3. Any comments you made on other users’ posts will only be saved to those users’ files and not to yours. Once the change described in this email is final, only that user will be able to change the sharing settings of those files. This means that if you have commented on another author’s private post, that author could choose to make that post and its comments public. If you would like to avoid that possibility, delete all your Buzz content now.
4. The new Google Drive files will only contain comments from users that previously enabled Google Buzz, and the files will not contain comments that were deleted prior to moving the data to your Google Drive.Once the files are created, they will be treated the same as any other Drive file. They are yours to do with as you please. This includes downloading them, updating who can access them, or deleting them.
Before these files are created, you can view the Google Buzz posts you have authored here. If you do not want any of your Buzz posts or comments saved to Google Drive files, you can immediately delete your Google Buzz account and data.
Thank you for using Google Buzz.