Apple/Facebook vs. Google/Google+

Anyone on dat dere google+?

Facebook is doomed for extinction. Google is going to put a stranglehold on social networking just as they did the search engine.

I tested google plus and I wasn't that impressed. I think google still has ways to go because:

1. Google is the underdog, and it's product is surprisingly similar to facebook.
2. People from Facebook aren't going to want to start over unless google has a supremely better product (which isn't the case right now)
3. Facebook allows you to do what circles does (you can create different lists and privileges for different groups). Though for some reason people don't seem to care about it enough to look it up.
4. Google doesn't have it's own development kit through which apps can be made on the platform of google plus. For facebook, think Zynga (farmville, cityville, poker) and many other companies which make tons of money on facebook, all because facebook opened up app development on their site. A large share of facebook users, especially the younger ones who enjoy social games, will be tied to facebook this way.
5. This is completely hypothetical, but circles may be a bit "too much". A new term if going around in anthropology called second-order information, which is conclusions people get from background information (Think someone not accepting a friend request, implying they don't like you even though they never said anything about you). With friends, acquaintances, and other circles, the lines may blur. People may not like that they are a friend rather than an acquaintance or vice versa. Facebook makes this easy by making everyone default friends. Also, how widely circles is accepted is highly dependent on how comfortable people will be mixing work (acquaintances or other) with friends, even if they can't see the same things on profiles.

Pretty much google plus might have promise, but they have a long, long way to go before the masses adopt it.

haven't tested it yet, but I thought people couldn't see what circles you put them in...

I expect facebook will keep millions of stay-at-home moms as users, wanting to play bejeweled and farmville all day long and share status updates about eating turkey sandwiches.

Google + will likely be adopting more sophisticated users, wanting more customization in their social networks. I haven't posted party pics up on facebook in a long time, because of the privacy concerns. But if Google+ makes it easier to see exactly who can see my posts, i'd be much more likely to be active on it.

@sayandarula

True, but it will be pretty obvious which group you are in. And once again, that is completely hypothetical, it may or may not come up.

Also, on the other hand, one could also argue that after 7 years, people wouldn't want to start over (2 in my previous post). That's probably the biggest obstacle to google, that the social networking market is so saturated. So that's why I said google plus has promise, but I don't see masses of people switching over just yet.

I haven't used Google+ but based on the observation that people don't give a shit about their private lists on Facebook wouldn't it be seen as a pain in the ass to be forced to use Circles on Google+? If there's a default setting people can turn on that would be great but otherwise....

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I just want to be able to holler at bitches without my main bitch knowing about it.

Now that we have seen social networking the past 10 years (Myspace, Friendster, Facebook, Hi5 etc. etc.); I think Google has the wherewithal to compete with Facebook by focusing on its flaws.

1- Facebook privacy settings are hunting them; they changed them one too many times, and there are "rumors" that employers can see your pics. Google should fix that.

2- Facebook is starting to have a ton of dubious people (many fakes). Google should fix that.

3- Buying stuff through Facebook has never been easy. Facebook could have competed with Ebay, Amazon, or Pandora who knows. Google has youtube; and could develop better seller/buyer programs.

Social Network is about who is doing what. If many "cool people" are doing it; a lot of people will do it. All "cool people" now are on Facebook, then Twitter. So Facebook has that share. If the "cool people" move to something else, the rest of society will follow.

cool people: whoever you describe as cool, can be celebrities, rich persons, friends or coworkers.

As far as relationships go, how will your fellow co-workers feel when they see you classified them as a co-worker rather than friend or other people who feel they should be "higher ranked" in your social hierarchy for that matter? Are your "friends" able to see where you group them? Haven't tested it or read anything about it other than on here.

I foresee another Google Buzz. I mean, it's insanely similar and Facebook still has the functionality that dew me to it in the first place. I don't think FB will become the next MySpace simply because I was drawn to Facebook in part because of its ease of use and clean format. That is still there, and unless the value proposition is vastly different for Google +, it would be hard for it to change.

Everyone keeps saying that it's better because of the circles...easy fix for FB to copy. And as for the difficulty of categorizing your current friends into circles...wouldn't it be harder to migrate your entire social profile, search for your friends and then categorize them? I mean if its gonna be the FB of the future, would the end result be having all your friends on Google +?

Privacy settings mean like nothing to most people. As long as they won't get fired or arrested, I doubt most people care. I mean look at all the profile pictures of people doing drugs....yeah we value privacy.

I was lucky enough to score an invite, and I can tell you that I no longer see myself using Facebook. It's been fairly easy to invite all my fb friends to G+ using my Gmail contacts, and I can only imagine what will happen when it officially opens to the public.

RIght now there is NO way to post on someone's wall (other than commenting on a status), NO messaging, NO way to make your gmail picture different from your Google plus picture.

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Where is my Apple social network?

Apple should just buy Facebook and fix it. If Zuck won't sell, then I'm sure Jobs can have him "neutralized" (lol talk about killing two birds with one stone).

I hope G+ > FB

The social network market is mature now. Remember, Myspace is still out there, even Friendster still exists, but both can not compete against Facebook. Its important to remember that Google has already failed in this space- this is not its first social network- Orkut was.

I see this as something akin to Bing trying to overthrow Google in search- the biggest problem is that Google is "good enough." and gets the job done. Facebook is also good enough, and I think any competitor is going to have to come up with a pretty compelling reason to leave Facebook. As was mentioned before, I am not starting over. I have hundreds if not thousands of pictures of my own, and pictures I was tagged in that I have no intention on moving anywhere. My friends are on Facebook, my network is set.

Privacy is the biggest weakness of Facebook, but I don't think that is a compelling enough reason for anyone to leave Facebook- most people are too apathetic to really care, or already defensive enough about what they post on FB that having everything exposed isn't going to be anything more than an inconvenience.

what i think a lot of you are failing to see is that the "market" for social networks is not like the market for, say, satelite or cable providers where you choose one or the other. in social networking, it's perfectly reasonable to have multiple providers. in fact, most of us have both facebook and linkedin. i'm sure that myspace users didn't simply choose to leave myspace in one day... as facebook got better, they checked their myspace account less frequently until one day they never went back.

you don't have to "start over" with a Google+ account by deleting your Facebook and formally moving your content over. you can keep your facebook and all of your content, while playing around with your Google+ account on the side for a few minutes a day. initially, users will spend more time on facebook since they have most of their content and friends on the site. over time, as they acquire more friends and content on Google+, they will spend more and more time on that site. in the long run, USERS WILL DRIFT TO THE BETTER SOCIAL NETWORK, whichever one that may be.

i don't buy the idea that Facebook is "good enough" and can stay on top without a fight.

Here's some food for thought. The guy is definitely bias, but still has some interesting points.

http://www.bloomberg.com/video/72004804/

Yeah Google+ kinda sucks. I have an account but I don't check it anymore. Lack of walls/effort of circles/privacy not that big a deal, or at least not enough to be worth the effort/fb just got vidchat=no reason to be on google+.

• Facebook/Google: The WSJ Heard on the Street says that launch of Google+ has made Facebook look somewhat vulnerable. Google is using exclusivity and improved functionality in an effort to attract users to its service. Google is also looking to capitalize on Facebook's perceived shortcomings such as organizing contacts as well as video chat (which Facebook launched yesterday). The biggest difficulty faced by Google is whether or not it can get users to sign up. [Wall Street Journal] http://on.wsj.com/nl5wPM

It's different, but you have to remember that people love change. Even though it's tedious, people love change. Twitter focused on "status updates" and Facebook copied that, but that didn't stop Twitter. Google will be strong because it completes their ecosystem. They have everything else, but they need a social network, and the ease of everything connecting will make things different.

Yes, all our friends are on Facebook. But go back to when you were a teen. How many Instant Messaging platforms did you and your friends go through as you grew up? Up in Canada, we went from ICQ, to MSN, now the BB users to BBM, and the others are just leaving IM altogether or using Skype. Just like that, people can switch over. I never believed in Facebook as a long lasting model, just because people love change, and they can move to the next technology by just signing up.

I see it as a central location to broadcast to the public, talk to your friends, connect with professionals without messaging across your groups. And Google will monetize the hell out of it, and make that a large focus, where it was secondary for Facebook until after the early stages.