"Google is a $170 billion company. It employs thousands of engineers and developers. It tests, tests, tests, and tests more. In fact, its ‘designers’ once unable to pick a shade of blue tested 41 variations of it. It’s ludicrous to think that the Buzz fiasco was simply a result of under-testing."
"Google clearly feels pressure from Facebook and Twitter in terms of social networking, personal data access and real-time search, as well as location info from myriad geo-apps and smartphones. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been able to deliver products that have captured the imagination of broad segments of the consumer market lately. From Nexus One to Latitude to Talk, Google is in danger of being relegated to servicing geeks.
Unsure of its ability to successfully roll it out as an independent product, Google must have then decided to force feed Buzz through its Gmail user base of 175 million. Google executives likely reckoned that in a single day Buzz would garner more users than Twitter has been able to in two years after all that celebrity publicity."
http://counternotions.com/2010/02/15/buzzback/<added>
The EFF points out that Google recklessly abused information entrusted to it by users—their address books—to gain a competitive advantage in a market where it is entering late and facing off against popular competitors. This raises serious questions of trust.
"These problems arose because Google attempted to overcome its market disadvantage in competing with Twitter and Facebook by making a secondary use of your information," wrote Kurt Opsahl of the EFF
http://arstechnica.com/security/news/2010/02/epic-fail-google-faces-complaint-over-buzz-privacy-issues.ars
