The now-old rumored Google Me might be launched this fall, not as a fully-loaded, Facebook-killer service, but as a series of small steps according to Reuters.
Google pulled the plug off its high-profile communication tool Google Waves few weeks back. Orkut also failed to make it big in many countries. In India where Orkut ruled, Facebook is slowly dethroning it.
Google is losing out big time to Facebook in the social media scene and as we all know Google is trying to bridge this gap, with a flurry of acquisitions and the rumored Google Me.
Google’s CEO Eric Smith says “we’re trying to take Google’s core products and add a social component,”
“Everybody has convinced themselves that there’s some huge project about to get announced next week. And I can assure you that’s not the case,” Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt said.
The name of the project Google Me, is also more of an internal code according to Schmidt’s comments.
Despite its five hundred million users and omnipresence in the world of social networks, Facebook isn’t writing off the danger posed by Google’s intended plans to release a social network, according to a brand new report. Rather, the company’s gone into “lockdown” in reaction.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced that the company is on ‘lockdown’ for the following 60 days, with the workplace open on week-ends as the company attempts to update Photos, Groups, and Events ahead of the Google release.
It may be an indication that Zuckerberg feels a reworking of his website would help if Facebook is to remain dominant. And if an earlier statement that Facebook has Google’s social product plans in their possession is correct, that may imply Google has something quite interesting on the way.
Needless to say, Google still has not discussed any kind of information with the public about what it’s preparing.
After word from Kevin Rose and Facebook CTO Adam D’Angelo that Google was working on a Facebook competitor Called “Google Me”, everyone wants to know, is it real? Is Google really building a social network to compete with Facebook? Eric Schmidt, Google’s CEO, was recently asked about the “Google Me” and he responded:
“That would be a product announcement and I won’t say.”
There isn’t any hard evidence to back it up, however it does make sense that Google would want to operate a social network of their own, and buying Facebook is out of the question. Coupled with the recent launch of Google Buzz, a Twitter competitor, and Google Wave, it’s very possible that an app to compete with Facebook is their next goal. Stay tuned for more “Google Me” news at it develops.
The rumor mill is in full force. Yesterday Digg CEO Kevin Rose mentioned that Google is hard at work on a product to directly compete with Facebook. Dubbed Google Me, this product would attempt to replace and dethrone the king of social networking. Information is still scarce, and as usual Google has yet to comment on Google Me. I bet the executives at Google wish they would have just sucked it up and bought Facebook years back when they may have had a chance, now they’re forced to compete. It’s going to be a tough battle, although Facebook is king now, it’s conceivable but unlikely that Google can create a better product and steal users away from Facebook. Stay tuned for more information as it becomes available.
