Why I'm betting on Google Buzz and leaving Twitter

Earlier this week when Google Buzz came out, my initial impressions were quite negative.

I'll try explain my thoughts on the service, and why I think it will be a winner.

My main gripes with the service so far:

1) Lack of friends

This is the major issue with the service. I have lots of friends on Facebook and Twitter.

Why would I spend time migrating all my friends from each service there, just to get very similar functionality?

2) Super difficult RSS integration

I tried for a few hours to integrate custom RSS feeds. It's so straightforward on Friendfeed, why not on Buzz?

In the end I just gave up and put my Friendfeed in Buzz. Let's just hope Facebook doesn't pull the plug on Friendfeed until Google fixes the issue.

3) There is no standalone page

Right now you have to keep bouncing between Gmail and your Google Profile like an idiot

It'd be nice to have this somewhat centralized.

4) Privacy concerns?

To be honest, I stopped worrying about privacy when I started becoming more active on Facebook.

However, I'm not thrilled about the idea of receiving spam because of Buzz.

Why do I think Buzz will be a winner then?

1) Early adopters

It's pretty impressive that most of my Twitter contacts are already on Buzz.

It shouldn't have been a surprise though. Twitter is mostly early adopters, power users, whatever you wanna call them. As a result, leaving Twitter doesn't seem so bad now.

2) More than Twitter and Friendfeed (but less than Facebook)

Unlike Twitter, it's more than just text. Comments are threaded. You can reply in Gmail. You can post pics and videos. It can do pretty much all that Friendfeed can, or at least has the potential to do so.

I also like the more advanced features like search, the "people near you" feature.

3) Service integration

Buzz is integrated in Reader (that's partly a down side as well), Maps, Gmail, Contacts, Profile.

Twitter is integrated in nothing.

4) Let's be friends

At the end of the day, it's not so difficult to add friends again. We've all done this in the past when we joined FB and Twitter. So let's be friends