By Michael Hunter (Contributing Writer)

Yesterday The Big G (Google) announced Buzz, taking another shot at the social networking world (So long Orkut!). So what’s all the buzz about? Google’s Buzz seems to be in direct competition with the world famous Twitter, so much that it’s just another status updating network. Like most Google apps, Buzz integrates directly with your Google account and your Gmail inbox, which is cool I guess, or so I thought until I logged into Gmail and was bombarded with a whole bunch of obnoxious Buzz stuff. It also imports your pictures from Picasa and Flickr as well as your feeds from Google Reader, and tweets from Twitter. Wait… your tweets from twitter? How could Google be in direct competition with Twitter but imports your tweets? I’m confused

Being the techie that I am I figured I would give Buzz a fair shot, here are my thoughts:

I accessed it from my Moto Droid and though it was bit buggy, I did like the interface and optimization for the Android browser. I also liked the Google maps integration via layers on the Droid……BUT I’m still not thrilled. I feel more comfortable on Twitter without all of the annoying Buzz updates looking to take over my Gmail inbox. Buzz could very well be successful as most of Google’s projects are but will require a lot more people to use Gmail, and working in the field that I do, I know for a fact that a lot of people just use their Gmail address one time and that’s to get past the log-in screen on their brand spanking new Android device. Head on over to Google’s dedicated site for their new service and check it out if you haven’t done so already and let us know what you think. While you’re doing that I’m just going to click on this “turn off Buzz” link at the bottom of my Gmail and you can find me and the rest of the My Reality Tech team on Twitter.

@Jenna_Ice

@TariqBamadhaj

@Kimosaabi

@NathanMcDuck

@Mjhunterjr

(via: Google)

(image: Zazzle)