Google recently unleashed its answer to Facebook’s magnetic effect on the masses. In a sort of “me too” way, Google Plus (aka “G+”) has been greeted with open arms by the geekiest of early adopters and a flurry of attention by the uncaring media that only know that Google stuff is “kewl.”
So now we know that if Facebook suddenly botches it, screws the pooch or otherwise tanks so bad that people start leaving in droves (ala MySpace), we can set up camp with Google +, right? Well, sure but did you know that Microsoft and Yahoo!, not the media darlings that Google gets to be, have long been prepared to roll out the welcome mat to their similarly adorned social media hotels?
A quick scan of this feature matrix will leave no question about just how ready.
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Wow Joe, thanks for sharing!
Are you on Google+ yet? I’m underwhelmed, but I haven’t spent much time. If you aren’t on, let me know and I’ll shoot you an invite. If you are on, let’s connect and maybe you can show me a thing or two!
Hi Jeanne, Glad you like. Feel free to share.
Yeah, G+ is interesting but the current population seems to be mostly online marketers, Google fanboys and early adopters. I’ll have to use it as another channel to a prospective audience (much like twitter, facebook) but unless my friends and family find it a reason to migrate to from Facebook, it’s not going to hold much value to me personally. It was surprising enough to see many of friends and family appear on FB (driven there by upcoming class reunions more than anything). I’ve connected with you on G+. Maybe we can jazz up the place.
So Google+ will effectively do everything that Facebook does, but will it catch on? I think there has been a demographic shift in Facebook users, specifically a decrease in 20-somethings on Facebook. Maybe they’ll find Google+ more suitable. I’m interested to see how it all plays out.
It’s all about critical mass isn’t it? I recall FourSquare being released during SXSW and the adoption by event attendees was off the grid. But after SXSW they returned home where adoption had yet to occur so these early adopters had little reason to continue using it.