

Ask HN: Google+ Layers (In addition to circles) - samstave

It has recently been announced that G+ has added games to its platform. Games, invariably, that one would play solo or with people from your various circles.<p>While I am sure this is a natural progression of adding a feature to G+, I, personally, will likely never use it. I just don't play online games - and I don't spend too much time on G+ yet (I have never had a facebook account - though I now have a G+ account and use it to upload pics -- I don't follow anyone's streams, so, please take the following thought with that in mind).<p>I am far more interested in a suite of productivity tools being added to G+ than I am games. I call this functionality "Layers"<p>With Layers (L+) one would be able to create an ad-hoc group from one's circles who would have a shared Layer of information on which they collaborate and work together.<p>These Layers would allow for a virtual team to have a shared space, each Layer having a context, which would effectually be a Project. Tools available to the team on the same Layer would be Google Docs features, Storage, A Mail Viewport (the mail pane on this layer would be auto-tagged to the layer's context and would be the only mail you see in this tab, even though it is using your regular gmail account), Calendar Viewport (same as Mail - but you would still see other calendar items on the schedule, jsut say, in Black and White as opposed to the color - making it easy to discern evens related to that layer), A project feed - grouping all posts based on that context (think yammer), Shared Layer Contact list, etc..<p>The idea is, I am not really interested in playing games - but I am interested in having a powerful tool for organizing people from my circles around specific things I want to accomplish.<p>L+ modules and addons would allow for a project page, github connections, project domain + email address --&#62; helpdesk/issue tracking capabilities.<p>The ------ = the silo'd features available that I listed out.. The Layers would just be a view applied to each feature.<p>L2 ------- : Project specific view for Project 2<p>L1 ------- : Project specific view for Project 1<p>G+ ------- : Typical G+ experience<p>Allowing Layers will greatly increase the opportunity that G+ can change the online experience as opposed to being "simply a better facebook"<p>There is a great deal more in my thinking on this - but I thought I would throw the base idea out there for some feedback.<p>What say you, HN, do you feel this would be a good direction for G+ to go - rather than simply enabling the more distractionary aspects of a social network i.e. games.<p>Layers could be used to more formally organize political campaings, non-profit efforts, volunteers, virtual teams in startups, activism, etc...
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mattdeboard
I think most people's eyes glaze over at 'pitches' like this.

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chc
I don't think this is the right place to suggest improvements to Google+.

