I wouldn’t call it a failure but I wouldn’t invest in it if it was offering shares (separate from Google) either. It needs some major revamping. Relocating there from Facebook is a pain when for everything it has that’s better it’s lacking two things I like about Facebook. It needs a whole new look for one thing. I think they were very premature with the pre-launch.
Until they sort out their growing problems with their vague, poorly implemented and on occasion downright discriminatory names rules, with a policy of suspend first, ask questions later, they’re not going to be ready to get out of beta for a very, very, very long time.
Yes, this is the thing I’ve been hearing most concern about from friends who are on it. Apparently some people are having their entire Google accounts (including Gmail, Google Docs, calendars, all that) suspended or deleted without warning or recourse, which is quite scary.
Discriminatory names rules?
Exactly. I’ve had an account since the day after they beta opened (or was it the same day?). I hardly use it as, simply, so few of my friends do. The most active person in my stream is someone that lives on the other side of the world (New Zealand) that I went to school with and he’s convinced it has destroyed Facebook.
Right now I hate Google+'s UI, but let’s face it Facebook’s has changed radically over the years (remember when you could drag + drop to reorganise everything?) and so I’ve got no reason to believe that Google+ won’t.
I thought Google Wave was going to succeed, and yet it failed while still in Beta.
I have no idea if Google+ will work. I do know I have no plans on joining it (I’m not on Facebook either).
I am underwhelmed by Google+, but it’s way too early to declare it a failure.
I like the circles, but it’s not enough to make me drop Facebook yet.
I’ll call it a failure if it doesn’t experience a user population explosion in the next 6 months.
I’ve heard of the same on Facebook. Folks who’ve made fictional accounts on both sites have gotten them yanked, which is not something that makes me happy in general.
As opposed to the user population explosion it experienced in the first month? From week 2 to week 3 it went from 10 million to 20 million.
That could certainly be the result of folks just wanting to try it out, and a plateauing membership would be bad, but it’s already had an explosion.
Here’s a graph showing the time it took for Google+, Facebook, and Twitter to reach 10 million users. Link Obviously, Facebook has greatly helped Google+ grow in that people already have extensive networks in place that can easily be ported over to Google+, and the invite system builds hype up, but at the same time, it slows the growth of the website as users had to wait for google to approve their accounts. I don’t have a dog in this fight but I have an account on each and will probably use both for a long time. (Although, I’d prefer google+ to win out eventually as it automatically filters my stuff in terms of work appropriateness. I don’t really want to go to the trouble of setting up a second ‘professional’ facebook.)
That’s a fascinating graph. I find it fascinating that there are those who want A or B to succeed not due to any intrinsic merit but almost like a sports team.
I don’t put much stock in large number of users being an indication of it’s success.
Google Buzz had impressive initial numbers too. There is a big difference between people who want to check it out and those that will stay around and use it.
I think Google is risking losing those initial users unless they open it up to everyone soon.
That chart is sort of bullshit. Facebook was a small project that went from being only available to [Harvard? MIT?] students to just .edu email addresses for a long time to a place for everyone that wasn’t MySpace.
Google is a verb. Everyone knows Google. There are probably more than 10 million distinct people with Gmail addresses and possibly a few more than that who have heard of Google (that was sarcasm).
Couple that with the fact that Google created a shitton of instant buzz by making the Beta invite-only? Jesus.
I read an article, I think on Wired, about starting Google + and they had a paragraph or two about the creators sending out a “Heck check this out” email and they thought “oh we’ll get a few dozen users” and of course, they woke up the next morning to find hundreds of thousands of people had joined and were so happy and everyone loved it to a magnitude they would never have expected! That could not have been more clichéd IMHO. Like they were trying to live out some Silicon Valley fantasy. Puh-lease.
I’m not a Facebook fangirl. I don’t give a shit about the fellas who started it and have not seen the movie or want to give them my money. But I see this whole Google + thing as one big woosh on people who think there is something to it. To think it’s going to be awesome because “Google’s motto is ‘Don’t Be Evil’!” is to laugh. To go all Godwin on you - I’m sure Hitler’s motto was “Germany’s going to be awesome!” What’s not to like?!
Anyway that graph is like being impressed that the new Harry Potter movie sold 10 million tickets in a weekend while scoffing at the fact that it took your neighbor’s independent film at least two years to make a million dollars.
I’m sure stuff will keep coming out with manufactured data about how Google + is so much more X than Facebook, and it will all be marketing, and everyone will eat it right up.
And for disclosure…I am on Google +. I was on the first or second day because I have a good friend who works at Google. I visit once a week or so, when I get a notification in email that someone did or said something regarding me. Otherwise, I could care less about it.
So to sum up your post: Stop having fun!
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Well, clearly.
Also, a Hitler reference? Really? Look, here’s a joke I stole from the Internets that you can use instead:
“You know who else organized his friends into circles? Dante.”
I sent you an invite a week or two before you signed up. Under the invitation method that was in use at the time, that unlocked the gate, so to speak, and that was why you were able to create one without any issue. It was also how I got in.
Hah! Love it.
And, speaking as someone who doesn’t get sports, I’m starting to get sports fans. The more I see people passionately defending FB, the more I am getting all giddy with excitement for Google+. Go, Google+, go!
So true and it’s totally lame…and yet I find myself doing the same thing.
I’m finding more people circling me every day on G+ and my stream is far from empty. It isn’t quite as full as Facebook, but I have about a hundred people in my circles and vise-versa. I think it will be superior to FB eventually.
Same here. Most of my FB friends I know from other online sites are also on G+. The only RL people I have in my circle are my husband and a couple of friends.