Having gotten a google wave invite through a popular online community, I decided to check out what all the buzz was about.
After 4 or so days after being invited, I got an email from google welcoming me to the google wave community.
When you sign up, you’re offered a personalized googlewave.com address. You can either use this address or your existing email address to sign up.
Once you’re signed in, the UI immediately transforms to a layout that will be familiar to users of Windows XP and Windows Vista. The Sleek minimalism and Web 2.0 aesthetic feels right, if only a little unrefined, with a generic blue “glossy” framework. The screen is basically a whiteboard, with 3 columns – one for Navigation/contacts, your inbox, and a panel where you view the waves clicked on.
To get to the heart of the matter, and what has been making ‘waves’ in the online community, we have the Wave itself. Picture a communications method that combines real-time interaction and collaboration with a chat or instant message interface. In addition to the usual features of chat/IM, you can assign a wave to any number of other people on google wave, who can then all collaborate on the same discussion. Adding to the instantaneous nature of the communication, you can actually see the text being typed out in real time, errors and omissions included.
All in all, I would say it’s a product worth watching until it goes into beta mode. There is room for improvement in the UI, but as a test product it has a great interface that combines a lot of the standard features within the framework of innovation. As it stands, google wave is currently in private invite-only beta, so you’ll have to be resourceful and find someone willing to spare an invite (members currently get 15 or so invites).