Google Wave: 5 Ways It Could Change the Web

Google Wave arrives on September 30th. On that day, Google (Google) will start sending out 100,000 invites to non-developers to its much-anticipated real-time communication platform.

It’s not even released and it’s generating more hype than almost any other web product in recent memory. The reason stems from its game-changing features and their potential applications on business, education, customer service, email, social networking, and more.

So with Wave on the way, we wanted to explore some of the potential of Google’s upcoming product. We have a few of our own ideas and included some from Google Wave (Google Wave) developers, but more than anything, we want your ideas, so be sure to leave your great Google Wave invention in the comments! Who knows, maybe we’ll feature them in the future!

1. Wave-Powered Forums

This idea’s actually been in my head before, but it’s articulated with some depth by Andrew Camel in the Google Wave API Google Group:


“So I thought that it would be an awesome feature of google wave to have it power a forum. Each thread, instead of being multiple different posts, it would just be a google wave. So, instead of having to try a discussion by posting and going back to the page and checking for new replies and while you were posting, you missed a new part of the discussion, you can post like you are having an instant-message session and you can also save the posts like forum threads. I really think that this would be a great use of the google wave api.”

Real-time threads? Saving waves like forum threads? Google Wave?! Sign us up!

2. Wave-powered Commenting System

wave photo sharing image

We actually alluded to this possibility in our Google Wave Guide when we discussed Wave Embeds:


“One possibility: Google Wave Embeds may be a real-time replacement to static comments. If Google perfects wave embeds, you could even see YouTube (YouTube).com comments replaced with waves, although it is way too early to make any calls on the potential of this.”

Now that we’ve had some time to play with Wave, we think more than ever that Wave as a commenting system is a real possibility. Each blog post or YouTube video could have a new wave, where users could converse about practically anything in real-time. Anybody who comes in late can just play back the wave and get up to speed. It could be a whole new era for commenting.

3. Wave-Based Content Management System

A thread in the API group discusses the possibility of using Wave as a project management system. I’ll be honest – even I’ve been toying with this idea. Here’s what Jason Salas said in the thread:

I think that maybe many of the major CMS vendors will create extensions (if we don’t do it ourselves) to integrate their products with Wave. That’s what I’m working on now. But that is a neat idea to actually use Wave as its own CMS platform, with assumed features
like document creation/management, scheduling, RSS feeds, (micro) blogging, archival/search, etc.”

Can’t you see it?

4. Wave for Customer Support


This idea actually comes from a thread in the Google Wave development preview titled “What Will You Use it For?” It’s a remarkable discussion and brainstorming session over the potential of wave. One of the most fleshed-out ideas in the thread, though, is Wave for customer support. Here are some of the bullet-points for how Wave could be used in customer support:

- Sending trouble tickets
- Incident tracking can be a wave
- Call center analytics gadget
- Distribution list gadget
- Customer meta-data gadget
- Surveys can be a wave

Real-time customer support? Yeah, someone please build that.

5. Wave for Education

We reported a few days ago that Google is giving some schools and businesses an early look at Google Wave. But why? What could Wave possibly accomplish in the realm of education and business? A lot, we firmly believe.



I refer once again to the “What Will You Use it For?” Wave in the dev preview for some ideas for how Wave can be used in education.

- Building a more interactive / creative learning environment
- Proofreading / writing papers
- Brainstorming potential project ideas
- Interactive tutoring from home
- Collaborative Environment for Cyber Schooling

With more widgets, you could embed streams and communicate with professors in real-time. We’re excited about Wave’s potential to transform education.
What Are Your Ideas?


We’ve highlighted some of our ideas and many ideas from enthusiasts across the web. So now it’s your turn. What is your idea for Google Wave? We want to hear your thoughts and your opinions in the comments.

Oh, and if you need a little inspiration for your idea, be sure to check out our comprehensive Google Wave coverage:

Debating the power of Google's Wave

We've had about a week to absorb the Google's pitch for Wave, its new experimental communication platform, and about a day to try the actual early "sandbox" build of the service. See our hands-on review. But there's more to talk about with Wave. It's not just an app, it's an important evolution in the philosophy of written communication.

People will see Wave in different ways. For some, it's a clever take on e-mail. Others will see it as instant messaging with new features. Developers will look at Wave's open specs and APIs, and see a framework for new collaborative apps. But is it really any of these things, or just a crazy experiment from Google's Australian outpost?

Is it better than e-mail?

CNET Editor Rafe Needleman:

In some ways, it really is. With Wave, you don't reply to a message with a new message, you instead add your reply to the message itself. When there are multiple people involved in a conversation, this can prevent a lot of confusion. There's only one "wave" in a conversation, not a volley of messages flying around that repeat each other.

CNET Senior Writer Stephen Shankland:

Gmail users accustomed to conversation view, which stacks the back-and-forth discussion into a single view, will have an easier time adjusting to Wave's ways.

And just as Gmail works best if you only deal with one e-mail at a time, Wave is good at only one wave at a time. That's fine for a lot of IM-like chats, but if you work in depth on multiple waves simultaneously, think about opening multiple browser tabs. There are boldface indicators of new activity in your inbox, which tell you who's active, but with multiple tabs you won't always see them--especially if your inbox gets crowded with new waves.

Needleman:

It's fun to play with now, but we don't know what using Wave will be like once we start getting overflowing inboxes of waves.

Shankland:

Right. Every Net communication technology goes through a honeymoon period where just you and your close contacts use it. Then the whole Net discovers it and your little paradise becomes just another conduit for spam, inane jokes, and trivia. Expect the same issues with Wave.

Needleman:

The thing everyone is going to make a big deal of in Wave is that you can interrupt someone who's carefully writing a message to you. You can barge into a message before they're done with it, demand the writer's immediate attention, and force them to shift from composing to replying. There will be a way to hide your real-time activity in Wave, but the default mode is real-time. It's interruptive and very different. There will be people who hate it.

more google wave