No kidding.... we keep getting an influx of people seduced by the charm of Austin who then turn around and force the charm to go away (see the recent destruction of the Cathedral of Junk for an example). I know, I'm making sweeping generalizations.
The infrastructure is definitely not set up for all of these new people.
Anyway, that's my doom-and-gloom for the day. Welcome to Austin?
Personally, I use Buzz frequently - especially after dropping Facebook. It's a combination of short-form Twitter posts re-posted to Buzz, link sharing via Google Reader, Picasa/Flickr galleries and nice medium/long-form posts by friends that stir actual conversations. YMMV and I don't really care.
Yep, totally agree. The mobile version of Buzz is dedicated to Buzz and it's an order of magnitude better than the 'embedded in Gmail' version for desktops.
timmaah, are you sure you're not doing something "unusual" here? A browser that this doesn't work on, no-script, browser security settings maybe? Just wondering how you avoided it.
I've been pretty anal-retentive about blocking apps, setting app access, etc. for some time now and educating my "friends" on how to do this. I'm very aware of when I authorize an application and have used FB Connect twice a long time ago on sites that did not show up as unsolicited apps. Sites I visited this morning, however, are showing up. I never logged in to those sites (or have any kind of account, made a comment etc). This unauthorized "installation" is very much happening.
Truly. I'm getting sick of this. In the past I've defended Facebook and been a fan of their developer tools and relations. About had enough at this point.
Yeah, you're correct. It's gotten to the point that if you're a Facebook user you either have to not care if your data is shared or remove anything you may have added and care about.
But you know what? There's a setting in Privacy Settings->Applications and Websites called "Instant Personalization". Uncheck it and there you go. I realize there are a lot of people who won't do this but the option is there.
I suggest looking at the Facebook social plugins on the developer's site. Play around with them for a few minutes and you'll see that they are somewhat benign. I may be wrong and am open to someone telling me that if they present examples.