Recently Google announced Google Wave, a new service that melds email, instant messaging, online forums, blogs, SMS and wikis into a robust messaging service.  It works in real time (you can see others type live) and creates a thread of communications between two or more users.  It supports formatted text, photos, videos, documents, maps, drag and drop file sharing and other tools, and it has an API for future application integration like embedding search, translations or maybe even a game (playing real-time chess via email will soon be an option).

Because the main focus of the application is to communicate between users, it’ll mostly be used for personal purposes.  It’s essentially a collaboration dashboard. Will it impact business email marketing?  That remains to be seen, but it will change the psychology of communication as it reinforces the social aspect and a collaborative environment.  It’ll likely provide a unique opportunity for businesses to truly interact with their audience, as conversations could take place in the “email” space rather than on other mediums, such as Twitter.

We’ll see how this service really works when the public can use it in the next few months.  Want to be notified of the public launch?  Sign up at wave.google.com.  And if you have a half hour or more to spare, watch the video below- it’s worth the investment.  It’s over an hour, but even watching the first portion will help you better understand the application.

Tags: googlewave

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