Rethinking the social web

I was thinking about Google Buzz, and Twitter, Facebook, Plurk. And also about delicious, Flickr, MSN, Gtalk. And how each of these sites try to communicate and integrate with each other, because nobody wants walled gardens like AOL anymore.

And then I realized that this is what RSS was invented for. Or Atom. Here's what I produce, now consume it the way you want to. We should all go back to blogs and RSS readers. But then how do you comment on something without forcing people to go to your website? I think we've been trying to solve this problem for 10 years now, and that's how pingbacks were invented, and the Comment API, and RSS and Atom, culminating with Google Buzz this week. And it's still not working.

What I would like is a single place where I can write, put pictures, videos, etc. It could be Google Buzz, since it integrates with my email client -- except that I use Google Apps, which does not work with Buzz, and when it does it will be a mess: I already have a Google Buzz at my email roberto@dealmeida.net, just like I have a Google Docs account at roberto@dealmeida.net, and a separate one on Google Apps for the same address.

But I want to post status updates, texts, pictures, links, movies, etc., in a single place.

And I want people to comment on them. Suggest more stuff. Facebook does this, and Google Buzz also does, but they force the solution onto your friends. A weblog is more open, but then people have to visit your website in order to comment. I don't know, maybe Google Buzz is a step in the right direction, if it can be integrated with other email clients. Who knows?