After I found out what Google Buzz was doing, I turned it off as quickly as possible.
…or did I?
As if there weren’t already enough layers in this cake of failure, apparently the link at the bottom of GMail that said “Turn off Buzz” does not actually turn off Buzz – it removes the Buzz cruft from the GMail interface, but it leaves you in the network.
So in an attempt to really and truly escape from Buzz, I went to my Google profile page, where I found a checkbox (checked by default!) saying “Display the list of people I’m following and people following me”:
I unchecked that. Then I went to my GMail account, clicked on Settings, and found the same option again. There was also a link that said “Disable Google Buzz”, which sounded pretty good, so I clicked that too:
So now I should be completely out of the woods, right? To double-check, I went and took a look at the public Google profile of Aza, one of my friends who was actively using Buzz. And there I saw a message that said “Aza is following you”:
Aza is following me? So is Buzz really turned off or not? I’m still not sure what’s going on here.
[Edited to add]: Apparently I needed to turn Buzz back on so that I could go in and click “block” on each follower, one by one, until the list was empty, and then turn it off again.
February 20, 2010 at 2:27 pm
Jono,
Thank you for this post as well. Thanks to it, I now know that I have completely disabled Buzz on my gmail account.
February 20, 2010 at 3:37 pm
Wow, thanks for the info. I first turned off Buzz at the bottom of Gmail and thought Buzz was away. But you were right, it wasn’t! Now it really is! 🙂
February 21, 2010 at 6:34 am
This Buzz thing is a mess. We don’t need another social networking site, especially one that doesn’t value its users’ privacy or desires.
Google is spreading itself too thin, trying to get involved in everything. They buy up any good idea and somehow funnel it into another branch of the Google world takeover plan.
I didn’t realize I was this angry at Google, but I kinda am. They’re starting to get very greedy and selfish. I still don’t know whether I’m on Buzz or not.
And what about that big red “Disable Google Buzz” link that says it will delete your Google Profile? I don’t want to delete my Google Profile. I actively and voluntarily set that up. But I have no desire to partake in another social networking site when the two I’m already in give me more than enough useless information. (Facebook moreso than Twitter, because Twitter gives me links that I can use. Facebook just lists all the drunk acquaintances I have.)
February 21, 2010 at 9:01 am
Sure, “never ascribe to malice what could be ascribed to stupidity”, but when the stupidity gets to this level from somebody who really should know better, I think I have no choice than to expect malice (or similar stupidity in future) … http://counternotions.com/2010/02/15/buzzback/
So, I have awarded Google with my vote of non-confidence and removed all what I can from my account, GMail went first. We should be really able to do better on our the servers we have control of or to use some serious partner.
Why should we expect any other results when we store our private data with an advertising agency?
February 21, 2010 at 12:38 pm
[…] Trying to escape from Google Buzz: The Adventure Continues! « Not … […]
February 22, 2010 at 7:18 pm
[…] out Jono’s blog if you’d like to turn off Google […]
February 23, 2010 at 12:28 am
Um, if you’re not using Buzz, then there’s no reason to block anyone because you’re not posting anything. Buzz is vastly superior to Twitter and I hope Twitter dies a miserable death now that Buzz is around. They screwed up at first, but the privacy controls now are perfectly adequate.
March 1, 2010 at 11:06 am
Hmmmh… Buzz moves a mail platform into a inaugural social network tool. I always admired Google for their search spirit. But here I disagree with them. My person is in our times a majour concern. Although Google started taking serious the privacy concerns, Buzz although requires to overcome its burden. the people at Google seem to be joking with human data. Google has to do some better reasoning about its consequent activities.
March 2, 2010 at 6:38 am
[…] Trying to escape from Google Buzz: The Adventure Continues! […]
March 9, 2010 at 8:00 pm
You can always email them and personally request they delete your account and data. I had to do that on my itunes account once.
May 8, 2010 at 2:54 pm
hmm, I dont think to remove google buzz. Is it really bad to activate Buzz? What’s the problem with it? I have no idea…