Hey, Calacanis: Google Buzz is NOT a Facebook killer

10Feb10

My reply to Jason Calacanis’ claim that Google Buzz just made Facebook lose half its value:

Jason,

Buzz might be a better executed product in some ways (as you point out in your email), but there are two HUGE problems with Buzz as a Facebook/Twitter-killer:

1) Way more active Facebook accounts than Gmail

The ratio could be as high as 10:1 in favor of Facebook (see links below). In network effect terms, that order of magnitude difference would mean multiple orders of magnitude of advantage for Facebook. Also, even if you have a Gmail address, there’s no guarantee that you use it. Look at the domains on jasonslist. I’ll bet there are a fair number of yahoo, hotmail, etc. addresses… and that’s skewed way more heavily to gmail than for non-Internet people. On the other hand, you only have 1 Facebook account.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Exactly_how_many_people_have_a_facebook_account http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How%20many%20Gmail%20accounts%20in%20the%20world

2) Weak branding

People think of Gmail for mail and Google for search. They think of Facebook & Twitter for status/tweets. It’ll take a lot more than just launching Buzz to change the mindshare of users. Buzz is a pretty weak brand extension, and putting it in Gmail makes it even weaker. There may be ways to overcome these issues, and I think that Google will outlast Facebook and Twitter. But for now, like Wave, Buzz shows Google’s strength and weakness: cool product & tech, awful strategy & marketing. IMO, Google’s abundance of users severely handicaps their ability to gain traction for their consumer products. Those teams never have to figure out how to get users for themselves, and they never feel the do-or-die financial pressure of a real startup environment.

Thanks,

Anthony

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Tags: facebook, google, google buzz, twitter