[jsnell]

The "no publicity is bad publicity" marketing strategy doesn't actually work if your product is crap. Take Cuil for example: they launched with a disastrous product with massive hype, and became the target of endless jokes. Regaining credibility after that must have been impossible, even if they'd managed to fix their search engine.

It's even worse if your product depends on network effects; poison the well early on, and you reduce the chances of going viral later even if the issues are fixed. It seems a safe bet that whatever chance Google Buzz had died with the initial privacy controversies.