Why I'm Rooting For Google+
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I'm definitely not thrilled at the idea of Facebook being the One True Social Network, but the idea of a Google social network makes me sad, and more than a little nervous. The fact that Google is trying to exploit their search dominance to funnel people into a Facebook competitor screams "anti-trust violation" to me, and the information-control consequences make me a little woozy -- I'd rather that Facebook dominate the space completely than give Google any more of my personal information. Google+ may not be evil, but it isn't exactly lily-pure, either.
I'm hoping that this is another classic case of Nerd Blindness (much like Rob Malda's famous proclamation that the original iPod was 'lame'): Google has an exceptionally good technical reputation, so techies are foaming at the mouth to get access to their newest plaything, while everyone else just sees this as an attempt by a gigantic company to destroy a good service that it sees as a threat.
Cheering for Google to win in the social network space seems to be to be a bit like hoping that IBM will take down Microsoft. When giants fight, I can't summon up any other feeling than fear that the rest of us are going to get squashed.
You know you can choose not use Google services right?
Google forced me to stop using Notebook, by taking it away. They seemingly forced previews on my search results, so that when I hover there's a bunch of big graphics that now pop up. Possibly I can opt out of it, but why do that? People bitch up a storm about "opt out" email newsletters, but "opt out" Google UI changes (assuming you can opt out) are met with near universal cheer and slavish devotion.
I deal with it because pretty much all other players are the same - Google's really no better or worse than anyone else, as far as I can see.
Regarding search previews, I can agree that the option to turn them off would be appreciated. However, I think it's still a stretch to say that you're "forced" to view them; hovering alone does not trigger them, only clicking within search results.
Personally, I had hardly noticed that search previews were still enabled, though I've never had a use for them. They do seem more useful on reappraisal than I had originally remembered, however.
Personally I'm glad Google has finally stopped acting like every feature they have is a unique product. It's pretty obnoxious to go back and forth between their various services.
I feel differently, but see quite a few (mostly non-technical) people agreeing with you - at least, here in Europe. Google already owns most of the data you've given facebook, and treats it a lot better than fb imho (e.g. allowing export/deletion). I don't see why giving Google access to a bit more of your personal data will somehow decrease your quality of life.
The reason people are foaming at the mouth, as you call it, isn't the exceptionally good technical execution, but rather how Google handles consumers (giving them more rights over their data) and developers (they're the underdog, they have to). This is another reason I like Google entering social - Facebook has been behaving rather arrogantly, and it does seem like they really own the social web [1]. But with Google acting as a threat, perhaps Facebook will be forced to soften up on some of its policies. Competition is a good thing, and I really doubt it will result in the rest of us getting squashed - In fact, I really believe we'll profit from those giants having to compete. For other reasons why G+ is anticipated highly, try http://www.pcworld.com/article/234825/9_reasons_to_switch_fr...
Lastly, IANAL, but I doubt promoting one of your products on one of your products is in any way illegal. The Google homepage has been showing us links to Docs, Reader, Gmail etc. for a long time without anyone getting upset about it.
[1] http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/13/its-a-facebook-world-other-...
Besides competition can only be a good think. Just imagine the mobile space without Android...
That's the point: why is Google interested in the social graph? They already have GMail, they can scrape twitter… what do they need G+ for?
To me, the conclusion is that they do this to crush FB, which they might perceive as a threat. Or, the other idea is that they might just want to extend their brand to encompass more of the consumer market. More adspace, and the likes…
Coming from those roots you know full well that its better to crush/compete or acquire companies that can do to you what you did to others many years ago, its safer then thinking your to big for anyone to catchup and become complacent (and far cheaper if you nip it in the bud).
If i was the CEO at google i could name a few companies that would make it hard for me to sleep at night and facebook is high on that list. Look at the trend, buzz - (because they couldn't acquire twitter), originally orkut ( friendster fell through and to atleast have some form of social networking product), google offers (either cause groupon's model wasnt to their liking or groupon reject the offer. Irrespective of this groupon still perceived as a threat) along with countless other startups that made cool things that could have potentially competed with googles flagship products.
I think its simply cause google knows the web game well, they know that any of these startups (and other hot web properties) can bring them down if they are not careful and its better to acquire or if not keep building competing products so they still stay the dominate power.
Now trying to compete with a product such as google+ that could in time be comparable to the currently dominating player is I guess just good for future business :)
Wasn't that the whole issue with the Microsoft anti-trust suit - that Microsoft bundled ("promoted") IE with its other product (Windows)?
Microsoft used its desktop OS monopoly to ensure that IE was far and away the most dominant browser on the internet. It's a great example of how these sorts of otherwise-legal tactics, when taken to the extreme, can lead to situations that are bad for consumers -- which is why the anti-trust laws exist.
Also, my point still stands - Google has been promoting other products on their homepage for a long time without getting sued. I don't understand how Plus would be different from, say, Reader.
Apple & Google are competing and they are trying to outdo each other. What resulted is more advanced phones and cheaper prices. Consumers win.
Can you imagine if nobody challenges Facebook? Did you know that what Facebook released recently (better Photos, messages, etc) is a preemptive response to Google+?
We have seen time and time again that monopolies are bad. Internet Explorer did not innovate for some time when it was in 80+ of computers. Microsoft started paying attention to IE again when Firefox and Chrome came out.
It hires so many people (including hundreds of interns) because it wants to build a platform and a tool for people to use to keep in touch with each other. I don't think Facebook is playing from the same opening book as Microsoft.
IE is a different story because it is not a core product of Microsoft. Facebook is the core of Facebook (obviously), so it cannot just let the product atrophy like MS let IE.
Same can be said with Apple. IPhone would keep improving with or without Android. But I feel like Apple is being more agressive about it with Android around.
Oh, and they have a list of projects their devs contribute to here: https://developers.facebook.com/opensource/
...i don't know where this clothing analogy came from. probably because it's Saturday and i was just doing laundry.
I would actually prefer if more companies got into both search and social. It would be great if Facebook would build a "social search" function as well. I think this is more realistic than wishing that companies would stick to one thing only.
Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft - they all want it all. More competition would mean a better experience for all, including better privacy, and perhaps something more federated. These guys are all attacking the same problems in different ways, but in the end, it's all the same thing.
You could argue that the Internet has always supported social networks with email, World Wide Web, FTP, etc. But social networking sites add another layer that ties everything together in a way that's accessible to the layman. In that sense, social networking sites are really in the business of authentication and authorization. Unfortunately, they're doing a lousy job of it, with their walled gardens.
Google already rules in search, phones, and now our social life. With Chromebooks they will get a bigger chunk of it.
They have ten times more potential for evil than Microsoft ever dreamed of having in the nineties, and they're mainly an advertising company, instead of a business-software supplier like MS or IBM.
Just to compare, Apple might be 'evil' and has a lot of indirect influence in the market, but an end user can perfectly avoid using ALL of its products with absolutely zero strength. Same with Microsoft today (except for MSN and Skype, or Windows if you're a gamer). Facebook and Twitter are the same, completely disposable (unless you're doing 'social marketing').
But to stop using Google, you need to jump trough hoops. It became like a drug dealer that's bringing new stuff day by day.
I used to root for Google, but these days I only hope for it to get smaller so don't get squashed. =/
Disclaimer: YES, competition is good, and Facebook NEEDS competition to improve, but I don't like the fact that Google is trying to 'rule', instead of pushing for open protocols (like OStatus), federation (like XMPP and e-mail) and such. I'd say that Google+ killed the possibility of having something like Diaspora (which was already dead, but there was still hope in the air), unless they go back and make Google+ federated.
How so? You have alternatives to all of their products. About the only way you're compelled to interact with them is if you want to send E-mail to someone with a Gmail account, or if someone insists on you viewing some Google doc.
It became like a drug dealer that's bringing new stuff day by day.
And this is different from Apple how?
Maybe it is just me, but in a scale of 1 to 10, how hard it is to voluntarily stop buying/using products from Google, Apple, Microsoft and Facebook?
I disagree - Can you clarify why you think so? You see, Google is probably the most vulnerable of the tech giants: If users stop visiting their sites for <i>whatever</i> reason, they'll die. It's really easy to switch to an alternative if you don't like what Google does, and Google even promotes this ease because they think people will be more willing to try out their services (think about the DLF team).
Microsoft, Apple or Facebook on the other hand, have already sold their product, and now the consumer depends on <i>them</i>. MS, Apple and fb sell products that tie people into their services once they buy into them. After that, they don't have to care what Joe thinks about their business practices anymore, and can therefore act almost any way they want.
I get the impression that the folks at Google actually take their unofficial motto "Don't be evil" seriously, but even if I'm mistaken I don't have to be scared - Google would quickly be out of business if they piss consumers off. And they know it.
From a search standpoint, there aren't many viable search players that can deliver good quality results. That's the fault of the competition 10 years ago not paying enough attention, but the moat is so great that it's going to be a gargantuan task for anyone to truly "take on" Google at any meaningful level for a long time to come.
From a "I browse the web" standpoint, the average person will be encountering googleness all over the place in the form of ads and analytics. It's not easy for the average person to opt out of being tracked by the Google machine (yes, possible, but not easy for most people). So, most people are part of the Google universe in one sense or another. Even if many people stopped going to Google's search properties, their grip on display advertising is enormous, and that area of business alone could keep them going for years to come without any serious competitor in sight.
"Google would quickly be out of business if they piss consumers off."
MS fanboys said the same thing about MS 10-15 years ago. It hasn't happened. MS seriously pissed off a lot of people (antitrust suit, etc) but they're still in business. Just like MS, Google could make serious strategic blunders multiple times for years, and they won't suffer any serious long term damage. They're too entrenched with no viable competitor, and who's going to try to 'take on' google? Where would you start? Mail? Search? Maps? Documents? News? Blogger?
"If they piss consumers off"
How would we know if they did something we disagreed with? Considering for most people, Google is their internet front door, finding info on Google's bad behaviour could quickly become a very difficult task (delete a few key records from the search index, and who will know?) How do we know they're so "honest" with our personal data? "Better than facebook" is a pretty lame answer, and I'm not sure one could set the bar much lower with a straight face.
TLDR: Even if you're not using Google, Google's using you.
I disagree. All their products have serious competitors people can switch to anytime: Search - Bing; Mail - Yahoo; Docs - Office; Blogger - Wordpress; Android - WP7; Chrome - FF; the list goes on and on. Google is facing heavy competition on all fronts, and only time will tell if they can step up to their game. (See http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/03/google-six-front-war/ for further information). But I like Google's attitude of creating lots and lots of new products, without being concerned about who they compete with, as they really seem to shake up the industry for the better wherever they enter.
Lastly, your last paragraph about "How would we know if they did something we disagreed with?" sounds pretty paranoid to me. If Google screws up we're going to find out very quickly). Google doesn't control the internet. Blogs, Twitter, Facebook, traditional news etc. will make sure we'll find out about it, even if Google starts censoring their search results (which, admirably, they've completely refused to do in the past).
Mr. Timr, the poster above me, put it much better than I ever could, so I'll just quote him:
"When giants fight, I can't summon up any other feeling than fear that the rest of us are going to get squashed."
So while data collection is creepy and monopolies are harmful, I trust Google more than I trust Facebook.
Note that I don't believe Google is actually very much better than Facebook in privacy terms. Google keeps everything you do, forever; while Facebook tends to share everything you do, right now. Google does less immediate privacy damage but perhaps more in the long term? What happens when Google gets hacked and it's not just your username and password released, it's everything you've ever searched for and every website you ever visited that had a Doubleclick ad on it? Privacy tsunami, that's what.
They allow you to do things like that (not to mention data liberation efforts), which is the point the parent was making.
Export your data: https://www.facebook.com/help/?faq=18844
Delete your account: https://www.facebook.com/help/?page=185698814812082
Google operates with 30x more engineers than Facebook does. Their bandwidth is exceedingly larger, and this is why features secondary to the user-experience, like data-portability, have historically been lower prioritized at Facebook.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Facebook
The Instant Personalization issue was the straw that finally broke the back for me. Without my permission, my Facebook info was suddenly being used to personalize non-Facebook websites[1], and in order to fully opt-out of that you had to visit each application and block it[2].
[1] http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/Facebook-Privacy-Concerns-...
[2] http://librarianbyday.net/2010/04/22/protect-your-privacy-op...
I don't know what Facebook did (if anything) to address these issues, and frankly, I don't care. I was tired of having to keep track of the parade of new privacy concerns about Facebook. It seemed every few weeks they added a new feature that required me to once again adjust my settings to opt-out of it. Once they even reset some of the security settings I had previously made, making them more permissive.
So, it is not surprising to me at all how these things "keep coming up".
Also can you truly delete your Facebook account? As I understand the process if you log back in it is restored meaning that they don't remove the data?
which social network do you use, that you feel comfortable with ?
Source: http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/06/inside-google-plus-so...
That is also why Google+ is everywhere (and why it was named Google+). It is Google plus the added value you can get from social graph. The +You part of the service itself is not the main point, even though it of course provides some potential ad space.
Yes, there are potential anti-trust issues. They can be seen as somewhat analogous to Microsoft bundling IE with Windows. That gave Microsoft a lot of trouble at the time, but today few would question that a consumer OS should include a web browser. Bill Gates saw where personal computing were headed, and reacted rationally.
Maybe search (and friends) can stay competitive without access to the social graph. I don't know. But Google don't believe so.
How does Google target ads at you without a social network? By sticking a pixel on half the web and watching where you surf, and running Bayes' rule on the results to determine that you're 25-30, male, live in California, are interested in punk rock, etc.
To cut to the chase, let's make this interesting: I'll give you $10k, US. Go "buy user data" from Facebook. For example: I'll put a friends-only privacy field on my profile. If you can tell me the contents of that field in a week, I'll give you another $10k. If you can't, please return $20k to me, and stop repeating this absurd meme.
What doesn't happen, is Facebook "selling data": taking money in exchange for ("selling") information you wouldn't otherwise have. It doesn't happen, and never has.
For the most part, only social networking techies are praising this thing. The last thing I want to do is give Google even more of my information, my friend's information, and so on.
Advertisers are google's real customers.
Facebook consistently disregards user privacy issues and doesn't work in a fashion many people believe to be ethical in any sense. Google, if by a superior PR strategy or their true drive to expand and 'Use Technology for Good' appeals to many people in the tech space and outside. Although Google is certainly a corporate giant, they are a giant we can trust is run by "People Like Us"(TM), and if for the good or the bad, I tend to trust Engineers and Scientists (Notice my bias in associating Google with Engineers and Scientists) a lot more than Businessmen and Politicians (And likewise for associating Facebook with the latter). Although I think the ideal Social Network would be run by some sort of neutral party, I recognize that the money is simply too great for that to be a realistic expectation - So in the interim I'm happy to have an alternative from Google, even if the implications for information dominance are daunting - I'm putting all my faith in their resolution.
I got a Gmail account in 2004 and since then have moved more and more of my life into Google's system. In those 7 years I've never been disappointed. I don't really have anything against Facebook, but if Facebook can do it, Google can probably do it better while also giving me more control and transparency. That's what they've done with everything else they've touched.
Google+ is getting more of a public social graph. I'll watch investors and traders, startup-types, media, local digeratii. What evil do you think it's going to do with that? It's a message board with some semi-private messages and maybe a spark or two. If it hasn't figured out my 'likes' by now then certainly an extra spark isn't going to flip the switch. Many of the messages are public anyway, like Twitter. Much of the social graph is public - you can see who I follow and who follows me, like Twitter. Google could already max out the evil with the Twitter social graph if it wanted to.
Google has my credit card number, my email (all of it), my location, my _email_ social graph, and my multi-year search history. What it already has dwarfs a few extra messages. Adding a bit of public social graph just isn't going to turn it into Skynet.
Edit: my friends and family will largely stay on Facebook. It's a nice safe place and I've set it up to be pretty secure. G+, well, that'll be my personal Twitter equivalent with hopefully a bit more bandwidth. I like the threads. Twitter I'll keep for my company's persona.
https://twitter.com/#!/moxie__/status/86620176832929792
'The "circle" I want is the one that doesn't have Google in it.'"The thing that I have come to appreciate most about founders is a deep obsession about one thing over a long period of time. When we first met Joshua Schachter he had launched three versions of what were sort of social bookmarking, that he had then shut down before he launched Delicious. Dennis Crowley has been working on what has become Four Square since vindigo, which was a flat iron portfolio company that we invested in over 10 years ago. Jack Dorsey you know, came up with the original version of twitter back in the late 90's and he had been obsessed about that idea for almost a decade before he built it inside ODEO. And I can go on and on and on, but that sort of maniacal obsession about a specific issue and a specific domain and a specific kind of service, is the thing that to me is the most compelling trait of an entrepreneur."
http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/23/fred-wilson-be-your-own-bit...
Fred wrote a post about moving from Flatiron to USV[2]
[1] http://www.vault.com/wps/portal/usa/companies/company-profil...
Also, images attached to posts are not with the stream but with your Picasa pictures, which is weird.
In comparison, Google doesn't let you download your entire search history and everything else that they collect about you--what sort of ads you like, keywords that have worked well for you, links you've clicked on. To me, my "search history" is my profile on Google while my wall/profile is my data on Facebook.
Do you get all of your connections (by what identifiers?), all the messages you've sent, and everything else?
There's a fine balance between respecting your privacy and flexibility, and those of your friends.
If you share something digital with someone, they can share it with someone else. That's just the way it is.
Interfaces and clients should help you avoid doing that accidentally, and even make it slightly challenging (perhaps you need to write a new client against their API or something) -- but preventing you from exporting your own data, or data that someone has explicitly shared with you, is just not justified. It sounds a lot more like a convenient excuse for lock-in.
Google+ seems to be trying the "all things to all people" approach as well, and I'm similarly skeptical of it at the moment. I'm still trying to feel out where it will fit in my own usage: if it finds a purpose other than just "Facebook replacement" I will probably use it, but otherwise it may be too difficult to escape the network effects.
Also, anecdotally, I am rarely logged in to Facebook constantly because it serves me no useful "productive" purpose. I catch up with friends and family only when I'm done working. With Google+ it is going to be that much harder because I'm always logged in to check mails and organize my calendar.
I'm sure it's just another oversight, like music.
Facebook, too, shall pass. We of the technology world should know this better than anyone.
I like this line, and it amplifies my feelings that in order for plus to be successful, it will require not only the polished product which is being introduced but also something that the other services lack.
OK so I don't really get it. This is nothing that can't be done easily with any email service now, using mailing lists. Dad can have a mailing list of his school friends, army buddies, etc. Why put another layer on top of that? Using email doesn't require any of the participants to have register or create yet another profile with yet another service. I don't see this as a very compelling example.
Circles solves a usability problem, not a technological problem.
As Facebook, Google, Twitter, (the stillborn?) OpenID and others compete to be the "company that handles online identities," everyone else can just focus on what they do. They don't have to run massive databases of users, just allow a trusted third party login and let people at the good stuff.
Aside from that, I don't really care too much about it.
Not really; you still need a users database to store everything else related to the user. You only really save on the authentication related fields, which are a very small part of it.
Maybe I did a shit job of explaining my concern. Or maybe I'm further off base than I think?
That would be a huge game changer (FB has 30% cut) expecially for those biggies like Zynga. Could this be related to Zynga's "rush" for the IPO?
I think Google, with their track record of APIs and platforms like GAE, could really light a fire under them that'd be beneficial to everyone.
Edit: The "best" part, if you follow that link, is that the project I mentioned that ended up cancelled would've had to be rewritten anyway now that FBML is on the way out.
FB is fully public everyone
G+ is user controlled sharing for both public and private..big difference
1. I'm a shareholder in GOOG
2. All the Facebook employees I've ever met have been kinda annoying, so I don't want to see those individuals get rich.
Get outside and get a life.