What is Google Buzz? Well it is definitely a threat to the likes of facebook and twitter.

As far as searching is concerned, Google is the defacto standard for internet users. But when it comes to social networking to keep in touch with friends and family, usually sites like facebook, myspace, twitter etc are used.

Google Buzz may change this.  Google Buzz adds social networking functions such as the ability to share links, photos, videos and status updates with friends from GMAIL. So Google has finally extended the gmail users with the social networking tools to keep in touch with their contacts who are already in gmail.

Google Buzz is also accessible from smartphones. That makes it even more interesting. Though it is officially launched some gmail users still do not have buzz enabled for their account. As google is enabling buzz for gmail users in steps. So if you are a gmail user and you don’t have the BUZZ yet, not to worry. When it is avaiable you will automatically see it when you login.

1. Blackberry: Research In Motion introduced this handheld device in 2002. Blackberry combined the features of Email, Web Browsing, Mobile Telephone, Text Messaging, Internet faxing and so on. The introduction of Blackberry was a turning point in the mobile information industry.
2. Blogs: Peter Merholz founded this new word BLOG in 1999. It was a short form of weblog. Even though there were thoughts about blogs ten years earlier, it only took off after 1999. In countries were freedom of expression is a given, even government bodies have their own dedicated blogs to keep in touch with their people.
3. Bluetooth: Bluetooth is a technology used to transfer and share information between various devices including mobile phones, computers and other electronic devices. This enables easy exchange of information between peers and friends.
4. Camera Phone: These days every mobile phone has inbuilt digital camera. This enables camera phone users to easily take pictures and videos wherever they are and share it with the rest of the world. Some websites and blogs allow easy upload of these user generated content which has resulted in huge amount of information that are end user generated.
5. Facebook: Mark Zuckerberg invented Facebook in 2004 at the age of 20. Today millions of active users use facebook to share information and network with their friends, colleagues and family. It is an interesting fact that more than 20 percent of these facebook users are using their mobile phones to share information.
6. File Sharing: File sharing has a long history. In fact its origins date back to as early as 1980. However with introduction of bit torrent technology the file sharing took off fast. Though media industry still has objections of these technologies, people still use these to share files, songs, pictures and even movies.
7. Firefox, Chrome: When IE was the defacto browser that totally removed Netscape’s Mozilla browser from the market, Firefox came with a bang and slowly took some market share from IE. Tabbed browsing, increased speed, live bookmarking, multiple home pages, security, robustness etc are some of the features that firefox had which propelled its uptake. Google introduced Chrome recently and is the third most popular browser in the market today.
8. GMail: Today you can safely say that anyone who used email, has at least one gmail account. Even though email had been around for quite a while before gmail was introduced, GMAIL took everyone by surprise when it was launched in 2004 with 1GB free space. The free space has been increasing ever since and gmail users too have increased ever since and is set to overtake all other email providers.
9. Google: There is no doubt that in the last ten years Google is the most visited website. Larry Page and Sergie Brin invented Google searc engine in 1998. It will take very many years to beat Google’s dominance in the Internet (If at all it happens).
10. IM (Instant Messaging): Today we can see people messaging using IM whether from home, office, train, bus and anywhere, anytime. Google Talk, Skype, Yahoo Messenger, Windows Live messenger are some of the popular IMs.
11. IPod, IPhone: Apple introduced IPod in 2001. This revolutionized the way we used to hear music and songs. It started with 5GB, 10GB and so on and today 160GB memory is available with IPod. The IPhone which was launched in 2007 with a touch screen phone features, push email, browsing and millions of downloadable IPhone applications free and paid has reduced the gap between man and machines.
12. Memory stick and Blueray: In 2000 8GB flash drive was available commercially. 256 GB thumb drives are available today.  Similarly in 2006 Blueray disks were introduced which may soon replace DVDs. In a similar size as DVD, blueray disks have 10 times more storage capacity.
13. Youtube: What Shakespeare said has come true today. When he said the whole worlds a stage, probably he was thinking of Youtube. Today Youtube has become part and parcel of internet life. From 2005 until now it has grown tremendously and its importance in future information sharing became evident when google bought it over for 1.6 billion.
14. Wikipedia: Jimmy Wales started Wikipedia in 2001 and from day one it has been a hit. Today millions of articles in various languages are available freely for anyone to read. It is contributed by volunteers worldwide and anyone can contribute to this knowledgebase which will be a HUGE encyclopedia for coming generations.
15. Twitter et all: Last but not the least, web 2.0 technologies and user generated content, social bookmarking sites, networking sites are mushrooming and taking this information age to a new level.

In a recent report published by ViziSense, Gmail has overtaken Yahoo in India. The total Gmail users in India is now 18,000,000 compared to Yahoo’s 16,800,000.

Yahoo has been the leader so far. However more and more Yahoo users have shifted to Gmail in the last two years. From August 2008, Yahoo users have been decreasing 8% each month where as Gmail users have been increasing 3% each month. In the first week of October Gmail has overtaken Yahoo.

Rediff mail is still 6,250,000 users and ranks third in India. 

However in the global statistics, it will take a few more months before Gmail can take over Yahoo. In the global scenario, Yahoo is still the first while Windows live comes second and Gmail is still the third. However, globally gmail users are growing and unless Live and Yahoo mails introduce any new attractive features, Gmail is set to goto number one.

In Google’s Gmail website there are many short cut keys. But it is difficult to remember all these short cut keys. To solve this issue a new keyboard is now commercially available. This keyboard costs 19.99 USD.

There are 19 keys in this keyboard and looks like a number keypad. Each key represents a shortcut key. For example to mark a message with a star (favourites), or to initiate a search, to go inside the message threads etc can be achieved by just a click of a button. This keyboard can be connected to your laptop or PC via USB ports. There is no drivers required for this keyboard. You can just connect and start using it. But before you start using it, you will have to goto your Gmail account and enable the ‘Short cut keys’ in your settings.

This keyboard was not designed by Google. A film producer, Charlie Mason created this keyboard. If you already use shortcut keys in Gmail this could be a thing to consider. If you have not started using Gmail shortcut keys then this is the right time to try.