Facebook, Twitter: Doing better than before Google+ The demise of Facebook appears to have been much exaggerated, as July saw the social network's highest ever unique visitor numbers, according to comScore. There were 162 million visitors to the site in July, compared to 161 million in June and 157 million in May. Some pundits had already decided that Facebook's days were …
I've been a bit disillusioned by G+ ever since the "real names" debacle started and still hasn't finished. When G+ launched there was a real feeling Google were listening, and making solid improvements. Unfortunately while the dev team seem to be much more approachable the People Who Make The Policy Decisions are still uncontactable and unaccountable.
I had hoped that Google had gotten over the lack of communication with users that they had during their Nexus One support days, but the lack of a decent justification of their real name policy has shown me that nothing much changed.
Although I must admit, Facebook are hardly better.
but it's unavailable if your email account is hosted through Google for Domains. In fact, I originally set up an account, then Google made everyone merge their Google accounts, and my Google Plus got lost in the process.
Epic fail Google. Please sort this out. THe only people who can't use Google Plus are those who use Google to host mail for their domans. Stupid. So very stupid.
I was put-off from joining by the real names debacle too.
...I often have a strong opinion to voice (mostly about my father), and dont really want to do this under my own name.
for real names - linked in.
for messing around with friends - facebook.
for reading celebrity drivel - twitter.
not really sure where g+ fits in?
It's WAY better than Facebook. The Android integration is also very nice too. Auto uploads of all my camera pictures (but thankfully not auto-share!!!), and loads of other nice stuff.
However the sad fact is, people buy and use what they know, that why idiots use Firefox, that's why idiots buy iPhones and so on....
Just wondering if anyone else here feels how I do about G+... To me it just seems too complicated and yet too simplistic all at the same time! Now Im adept at all the techno stuff and fully understand how G+ works, it's just not quite right with me. It's like they tried to make a cross between Twitter and Facebook but failed at making it better than either!
An example of what I mean would be that you can't post something directly to someone elses wall. You can share a post on your wall with just them, but thats not quite the same. For Twitter this works because Twitter is simplistic and doesn't try to be more. G+ seems to want to be Facebook and add all the extras, but is limited by the Twitter style posting.
Maybe it's just me? Maybe I'm too used to the Facebook way? Maybe I just don't *get* Google+?
Seriously, G+ recommended Mark Zuckenberg as a contact to me!
Freaky, but he is a close aquaintance of a personal friend of mine in the States. I was quite tempted to intro myself to Zuck on G+ and see if he'd add me.
So, I have ask, WTF is MZ doing on G+? Keeping his friends close and enemies closer?
Not being able to post on other people's walls is a feature. It means that your drinking buddy can't write embarrassing stuff on your wall for your boss to see.
I missed being able to do that as well, at first. But the added control over who gets to see what makes me far more comfortable sharing stuff on G+ and adding relative strangers to my circles.
It's a bit of a trade-off between privacy and social interaction. The Facebook model is like being in a big noisy party with everybody you know all in the same room. Fun in a way, but a little unnerving.
1 million or 0.6% difference between two months? Statistically barely relevant. Of greater relevance might be that over a period of a month only 20 % of Facebook's loyal legions bothered to login. Oh, and now it's close to being banned in Germany.
Twitter is on the up and up as broadcasters like the BBC use it to replace paid-for infrastructure. Wonder what would happen if anyone challenged the BBC Trust over the use and in particular the promotion of commercial services?
Is El Reg descending into eyeball-grabbing Facebook and Iphone rumours to keep the advertisers happy?
Google+, for all its artificial, velvet-rope hype, is still just a sterile, boring version of a previously-existing technology. That approach works wonders for search engines and web-browsers, where functionality and efficiency typically trump features and aesthetics. But for social networking? It's like communicating with "friends" in a plastic bubble...in a room with white walls...and no windows...which smells of chemical cleaner.
It is no position to lead to the demise of Facebook or Twitter, because it appears to an entirely different demographic.
And one must figure if Facebook had been granted the resources and web-presence of Google at the time of its release, it might have done a tad better in building a large user base more quickly.
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