Getting Started with Google Wave

Chapter 1. Introducing Google Wave

Introduction

Imagine being surrounded by a large crowd of developers, technology enthusiasts, journalists, and bloggers, eagerly awaiting a surprise announcement by Google. That was the setting when Google Wave was first introduced to the world on May 28, 2009, during the second day keynote of Google I/O, Google’s annual developer conference in San Francisco, California. That day both techies and non-techies alike were awed by the preview demonstration of Google Wave, a new platform aimed at transforming the way we communicate and collaborate on the web.

As Lars and Jens Rasmussen, the originators of Google Maps and Google Wave, and Stephanie Hannon, Google Wave’s Product Manager, demonstrated some of Google Wave’s features and capabilities, it became clear that this new platform has the potential to revolutionize social and business interaction on the web. Attendees at Google I/O may have been the first to witness the power and extensibility of Google Wave, but soon thereafter a broad audience around the world learned about this new platform as news of Google’s announcement quickly spread around the web.

The People Behind Google Wave

Google Wave was initially conceived by Lars and Jens Rasmussen (see Figure 1-1), a dynamite brother duo responsible for initial development of Google Maps. The similarities between the origins, and subsequent success, of Google Maps and Google Wave are no coincidence. The Rasmussen brothers have proven that they have ...