( Mashable ) -- AT & T is officially opening up its recommendation service , Buzz.com , to the public . We wrote about the project when it was still in beta in January . The service is essentiallyYelp meets Yellowpages.com and it shares a lot of similarities with the new Google Places . The idea behindBuzz.com is to leverage users ' existing social graphs alongside traditional , location-based business search . So if I look up `` movie theater '' in Atlanta , Georgia , I can see not just a listing of places , but also how many people have rated the place as a `` favorite '' and if any of my friends have rated or favorited it as well . Right now , Buzz.com integrates with Facebook Connect , so you can ask questions via Buzz.com and on Facebook to receive recommendations and answers to your queries . We assume that Buzz.com will integrate with Twitter in the future as well . Although open to the public , the product is still very much in beta . While the interface seems easy enough to use , I had lots of duplicate or outdated entries in my search results . This is something that can be cleaned up , but right now it 's difficult to rate or favorite a place when it is listed numerous times . While location-based search paired with reviews from others and from your own social graph is a very cool concept , it 's also not very original at this point . AT & T has been developing Buzz.com for more than a year and a half , so this is n't so much a case of being late to the party as it is poor timing -- and poor naming . One of the biggest questions we have about Buzz.com is , in truth , its name . Yahoo Buzz came to the market first , followed by Google Buzz earlier this year . It 's understandable that with a private beta already underway , AT & T would n't want to change product names ; however , in this case , we think the company should have considered it . Google Buzz coupled with Google Places is extremely similar to what Buzz.com is all about . The only real difference is that Buzz.com is designed to plug into Facebook Connect , whereas Google is using its own social graph . Facebook integration sounds like a plus , but at this stage , the extent of the integration and how useful it will be largely depends on how many of your friends are going to sign up and use Buzz.com . Google Buzz is n't the only service that Buzz.com is going against ; Yelp , Citysearch and more location-based social networks like Foursquare , Gowalla and Loopt are all in this same territory . What value is Buzz.com going to offer users that these already established services do n't ? From what we can see , Buzz.com is really an attempt to modernize the aging YellowPages.com ecosystem . With Google Places , YellowPages.com has increased competition , and we think that Buzz.com will need to get some killer features -- like pulling in recommendations from other location-based sites and promoting special offers or coupons -- and that the YellowPages.com database will need to be seriously culled in order for this idea to take hold . AT & T says it wants to use its experience in building mobile applications to make Buzz.com a more mobile destination . While a default Buzz.com connect/search bar might have worked in the pre-smartphone era , we live in the world of `` there 's an app for that . '' Buzz.com will also need to make its mobile applications and mobile support robust . In time , the site might develop into something compelling and competitive . However , at this stage , the entire concept strikes us as being too derivative -- in name and in function -- with myriad other services . © 2010 MASHABLE.com . All rights reserved .
New Buzz.com service is a cross between Yelp and Yellowpages.com . It allows you to search for restaurants by price, cuisine or location in your area. AT & T has been developing Buzz.com for more than a year and a half .