Google Wave - New Paradigm for Email?

How often do you use computer technology that was invented in 1965 and is essentially unchanged since then?  The answer is:  "All the time!"  Email was invented back before the Summer of Love in the days of IBM mainframes!  But, what would email look like if it were being invented today?

It would probably look a whole lot different.  It would probably be more visual, more interactive, facilitate multiple discussions, make following threads easier, have a playback function to see the development of the discussion so you can quickly catch up when joining one in process.

Surprise, surprise!  Google has been thinking about this.  A couple of their developers - led by two Scandinavian brothers who developed Google Maps - have been creating their vision of email for the 21st Century.  They are calling it Google Wave.

Saying that Google Wave is email for the 21st Century is far easier than describing exactly what Google Wave is.  It is enough outside of the box that description is hard.  It integrates so many things that are now separate applications - email, blogs, IM, voicemail, links to websites, hooks into web services like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter, networking, and the list goes on.  Indeed, the Google Wave developers gave an 80 minute demonstration to Google colleagues and developers showing what they have developed so far.  (I have embedded that video below.)

This is just the beginning.  Google Wave is Alpha at best.  Being open source, it should gather other developers around it to add functionality.  Because of that openness, It is probably wrong to say that Google Wave is a product or a program.  (There is, by the way, some question about just how open source Google Wave will be.  We are told, "many parts of the code" will be open.  It unclear which parts.  There have been some assurances from Google that it will be as open as possible and it would make sense if it is to become the new new paradigm for it to be completely open source.)  It is really a platform for development.  As much as Google showed off the capabiities of the platform, it has the potential to be even more as developers start working with it.  If this catches on, as I strongly suspect it will, I think even Google is going to be surprised by what it becomes.

Why should attorneys care about Google Wave?  What I am seeing in the Google video is a very young technology that has tremendous potential.  It already looks like a superb tool for collaboration, which in itself should get attorneys listening and looking.  It makes email a much richer and more social environment.  Whether Google Wave is the product that will ultimately succeed, it is certainly pointing the way to the future.  You won't be using it tomorrow, but in the near future this sort of rich email environment will be the norm.  If you want to stay ahead of the curve, watch the Google Wave video:

A lot of knowledgable and influencial folks like Tim O'Reilly, Techcrunch, Rafe Needleman, and Jeff Jarvis are excited about Google Wave's potential.  I know I am.  The more I think about it the less I think of a catching a wave on the ocean and the more I'm thinking of catching the Wave of the Future.

- Peter H. Berge
 

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written by Eric Cooperstein, June 18, 2009

Unbelievable! This is a total communications game-changer. I have questions, like how lawyers will maintain privacy (will people be able to block distribution?), but it’s possible that with 2 - 4 years, we will all be using something that looks like Google wave.

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