
Google+ creator: Don't call it a social network - iProject
http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/29/tech/social-media/google-plus-not-social-network/index.html
======
DeusExMachina
_"Google+ is just an upgrade to Google," says Gundotra. "People have a hard
time understanding that."_

Well, if they do, your product sucks. The onus of understanding what your
product actually is, is not on the user. You have to make a product so great
and easy to understand so that there is no misunderstanding. If you don't
manage to do that, you fail. Don't expect people to read your minds and know
what actually the product is supposed to be instead of what they understand of
it.

If Google+ looks like a copy of Facebook to people, then it's just a copy of
Facebook.

~~~
wissler
You may be too young to remember, but as computers were first becoming
popular, may people had a hard time understanding them. And no, computers
didn't "suck".

~~~
gareim
Yes they did. The first computers "sucked". They "sucked" in the sense that
most people couldn't understand them. Computers got popular and people started
understanding them as computers improved in usability.

If Google+ becomes popular one day after numerous improvements, it's
ridiculous to say that the first iteration of Google+ was successful just
because future ones were.

~~~
wissler
So for you, something "sucks" if it fails to win a popularity contest. I find
that definition meaningless. Computers didn't "suck", they were and are
magnificent, every step of the way.

------
jdp23
_Still, Gundotra won't rule out the possibility of sponsored stories down the
road._

 _We don't serve ads [on Google+], but that doesn't mean we won't have
sponsored stories," he says. "There may be more relevant forms of advertising
that we do believe work."_

Great. Something to look forward to.

------
hu_me
with google+ events and instant upload before it now i m starting to
understand what google meant when they said google+ is not a network its a
social layer across google properties﻿.

they are just connecting all the services and features into a single coherent
thing

~~~
taligent
Just like Facebook isn't a social network. It is a social layer across
Facebook properties.

~~~
saraid216
Except that all the non-social properties of Facebook are non-existent.

------
sbuk
"If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider
the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family anatidae on
our hands."

------
savramescu
I see Google+ as the foundation of Google Glass. Just think about it: Google
Glass + Google Now + Google+ makes sense. People complain that there isn't
much to do now, but I bet that it'll be a lot different come Glass.

------
jpkeisala
Social Network is Internet

~~~
da02
I agree. I also remember when regular people just called it AOL or "that big,
blue E on the desktop". All they care about is that they can talk to their
friends and ask their idiot co-workers about the latest meeting.

~~~
da02
I forgot to add some background info. I'm sorry for any confusion: As far back
as the 1800s, people began to imagine a global network that would unite
people, spread ideas, change the world, etc. The Internet grew out of that
similar vein. So it was social right from the start. Think Engelbart's Mother
of All Demos. Unfortunately, few people are using it for that. It's just an
over-glorified family newsletter to most people.

------
antninja
The stream, the circles, the IM and the notifications make it a social network
modeled after Facebook.

Hangouts are a different service as is YouTube.

~~~
esrauch
I don't think that is really a meaningful comparison. Consider that Gmail's
inbox is a effectively a stream of posts. It has contact management, IM, and
several different notifications (on the phone, count next to inbox and in
title, you can enable popup notifications on your desktop).

No one says that Gmail is modeled after facebook.

------
fear91
After unsuccessfully shaping it as a Facebook-killer? Google's PR department
won't give up :)

~~~
mkr-hn
They never positioned it as a Facebook-killer. That's an artifact of the tech
press. Like deelowe said, Google has been very consistent about this.

~~~
objclxt
Really? Facebook represents a problem for Google: when your primary revenue
source is display ads you want people to be _looking at your adverts_. Google+
is their solution to this problem - let people carry out the sort of things
they use Facebook for, but on the Google.com domain (and with Google provided
ads).

I think it's pretty clear one of the primary drivers behind Google+ is to
reduce the amount of time users spend on Facebook and transfer it back to
Google. The new 'Events' features are a good example of this.

The only reason Google aren't going around saying they're going to 'kill
Facebook' is that it's only going to result in inevitable embarrassment. What
Google PR says and how they develop their product strategies internally are
very different things.

~~~
mkr-hn
I made no comment on whether or not it was a competitor.

------
falling
Well Vic, it _is_ a social network _and_ the integration of identity in all
your previous services and it _is_ your response to the Facebook threat, so of
course people compare them.

Unfortunately yes, I think the message from Google has not been great it is
not well understood.

