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Comment by brudgers | Hacker News Reader

I'm on Google+ because I have a Gmail account.

I'm on Linkedin (and Facebook) because they offer value.

The irony is that most people use Facebook (and LinkedIn) as glorified publicly-facing email accounts with automatic reply-to-all and attachments set to auto-open and display in-line. The only thing added is a rudimentary voting system.

I use Facebook to share and chat about photos.

I use LinkedIn for recruiting.

I use neither as "publicly facing email accounts".

At some level, any application can be described as "forms with some text inputs and some submit buttons".

"I use Facebook to share and chat about photos."

Which I'm sure you used to do in email. Smaller circle, same user task.

"I use LinkedIn for recruiting."

I still use email sometimes for that. Smaller circle, same user tasks (attaching resumes, getting contact info for screenings, planning meet and greets).

Actually, it was Monster.com + email, so yeah, I guess LinkedIn replaced those.

You can easily do HN via email too; it's called a mailing list.

Definitely. But that's the thing. GP said he only has G+ because he has GMail, but uses those other email workalike interfaces because they are superior products. Just pointing out that they work in strikingly similar ways to email.

publicly facing email accounts

I believe the argument was that posting a picture is analogous to emailing that picture to your friends, and commenting on that picture is the same as hitting "reply to all" on that email. It's the same behavior, presented in a different format.

> The only thing added is a rudimentary voting system.

I feel obligated to take issue with your characterization of Likes as voting of ... any kind. Or were you referring to something else? I'm not an FB expert.

Wait, you have a G+ page, space, whatever automatically because you have a gmail account? Is there a way to get rid of that?

> Wait, you have a G+ page, space, whatever automatically because you have a gmail account?

No - you have to opt in.

> Is there a way to get rid of that?

If you want to disable G+ on your account (which will also remove your G+ profile), you can go to the "Google+" section of your Google account settings page (https://www.google.com/settings/plus). At the bottom there is a section labelled "Disable Google+".

When the most obvious option for avoiding a popup each time one accesses Gmail is joining Google+, it's a bit misleading to call it opting in.

If you'are getting a "join Google+" pop-up every time you access Gmail then there is something wrong.

That is definitely not the behavior I see on my alternate Gmail account which is opted out of Google+.

Not for me. Nothing on that link even mentions google+. I have looked several times as I know I'm a dopey twit and often miss the blinding obvious, but I cant see it!! Regional difference?

No - it just means you haven't opted in to Google+.

To check - I just created a test gmail account and opted out of Google+. The Google+ section disappeared from my account settings page, which makes sense.

I don't work on the sign-up/opt-out flow side of things, but AFAIK the policy should be basically the same everywhere.

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