Google Wave | S8080

s8080_user - Wed, 17/05/2017

Google recently announced Google Wave - ÔÇ£a personal communication and collaboration toolÔÇØ. ItÔÇÖs quite hard to describe but is, in a way, a combination between e-mail, instant messaging, wikis, and social networking.

A ÔÇÿwaveÔÇÖ is a real-time collaborative conversation ÔÇô it looks a bit like an e-mail, with participants (instead of recipients), and threaded conversations. However, anything can be edited at any time ÔÇô you can re-write things youÔÇÖve already posted, and you can also reply to other peopleÔÇÖs comments in-line (i.e. you can write a comment in the middle of someone elseÔÇÖs message). And because itÔÇÖs all real-time, if multiple people are looking at the wave at once, theyÔÇÖll see your changes <em>as you type</em>. Waves can also display images, maps, and much more. And did I mention that you can rewind and re-play conversations so you can see what changes happened when?

As I said, itÔÇÖs rather difficult to explain. Andy Ihnatko of the Chigaco Sun-Times summarizes this fact quite nicely:
<blockquote>"I imagine that there are as many pitfalls to defining and explaining Wave as Westinghouse and Edison found when trying explaining the concept of the electrical grid to the masses. You plug a light bulb into the socket and the crowd oohs and aahs and assumes that Electricity is all about illumination; itÔÇÖs a marvelous way of producing light without the open flames or soot of candles and oil lamps. Technically thatÔÇÖs true, but it misses the point."</blockquote>
Wave has the potential to take off big-time. Google are hoping it becomes the ÔÇÿnext generation of e-mailÔÇÖ. As such, theyÔÇÖre open-sourcing the whole thing, so that anybody can develop for Wave, and anybody can run their own Wave server (and any Wave server can interoperate with any other Wave server) ÔÇô just like e-mail. WeÔÇÖll be able to see whether Wave matches the hype when it launches to the public at the end of this year.

For another overview of Wave, take a look at GoogleÔÇÖs introductory blog post: <a title="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/went-walkabout-brought-back-goog…; href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/went-walkabout-brought-back-goog…;. You can also see Wave in action, in this video of GoogleÔÇÖs Wave Developer Preview event, where it was unveiled:

Interesting times ahead!