I'm in! And I like it! Is it perfect? No! Is it good? Yes! Is it a Facebook killer? Maybe in time, but in this guys opinion, not anytime soon. More on that in a minute . . . I've played with Google + for the better part of a day. Just the fact that it's held my attention this long says something positive about the product. I'll walk you through the key features and my impressions of each, and then we'll get into whether one should plan on holding a Facebook moving sale or not.
- Circles- There has been a whole lot of talk across the net about how Google has incorporated lists that it calls Circles. After using this for a while, I find it brilliant! As an example, I have created a circle that lets me follow some of my favorite tech journalists. Most probably won't follow me back, but as long as they post things public, I can follow! I have a family circle, that allows me to share stuff just with them! These circles are simple to set up! And you can either drag the person from your contact list into the circle or type in their email address. You can have people in more than one circle and you can easily delete them. Of course, you can delete a whole circle also. Deleting circles is a whole lot of fun! When you do, the circle starts to bounce like a basketball, and then rolls off the screen. Who would have ever thunk that Google would actually do animation like this in a Google product? I like it!
- Streams -When you create a circle, a stream is also created. So I can view a "Family" stream, a "Friends" Steam or any other stream that I have created from a circle. Of course, I can always just grab my "Stream" and view them all. But once these circles are created, this makes for an awesome way to view what is going on, without any other noise. Again, this is something that I like very much
- Photos - So I can look at a boxed view of all the photos posted from my circles, or photos from my phone, or photos that I have been tagged in, or my Albums. If you already use Picasa, then you already have several photos in Google +. What about all the photos you stashed at Facebook? Well, you might try this tool to copy those and move them to Picasa.This feature works, but visually, it doesn't blow me away. Of course, I have found Facebook's photo feature very buggy and slow too. So it's not exactly like I think that their photos implementation is better. One feature that I love about the Android app is an ability to automatically send any photo that I take to Google Plus. Nothing is shared anywhere however, until I share it. I do this by picking the "circles" that I want to share the photo with. If you send lots of mobile photos to your Facebook or twitter account, you will love this ability.
- Sparks - So if you are into say, knitting, you can set up a stream for knitting and Google + will grab stuff that is relevant to knitting. Currently, this looks pretty, but I found it kind of blah. Not impressed with this feature yet. Newsfeeds work for me. There might be a vision for Sparks that I am not aware of, but as it is, it's a waste.
- Hangouts - Facebook announced yesterday that it was incorporating group chat and Skype video into its chat services. Immediately, people started comparing Facebook's Skype to Google's Hangouts. One big difference between the two: In Facebook, you can only video chat one on one. In Google's Hangouts, you have the ability to video chat with up to 11 persons at once. I've done limited testing of both services and both seem to have acceptable quality. I think that Facebook's Skype might be a tad bit simpler to get going. But Google's is much more versatile. Obviously, it's going to take 11 high-speed internet connections to support that kind of bandwidth. In the end, I'm thinking that Facebook might offer a better experience long-term. Maybe I'll eat my words, as time goes on, and believe me, I will gladly swallow them.
- Huddle - Currently only available on the Android mobile app, this allows you easily build text distribution lists. As an example, I have a family list that allows me to communicate with only them. Nothing really amazing here. There are several standalone apps out there now that allow you to do what Huddle does. But Huddle is tied very much to the overall + experience. Word is, that Huddle will soon appear on the Web version allowing everyone to easily communicate, regardless of platform or hardware device.
- Profile - Just like Facebook, you have a profile. This tabs out your posts, an About page, your pictures, videos, things you have +1ed ("Liked") and your buzz feed. (Yep, Google's Buzz is still alive and living within +)
I've mentioned the Android app a few times. Also included is a Widget to allow you to quickly post to Google + Huddle is a standalone app or can be accessed from within the Google + app as well. As of this writing, there is not an iOS app available. But Google has submitted one and it should appear very soon in Apple's Appstore. Until then, I have tested the mobile web versions on both an iPod Touch and an iPad 2. The iPod touch version isn't bad and the iPad Safari version is really very nice. Neither of these include the auto-upload feature however.
What's missing? Other than 700,000,000 people, Fan pages, Farmville, and business pages. No Advertising at the moment either. And I'm not complaining at all! I do think that Facebook does a better job with space. It seems that streams can get awfully long.
Who should switch to Google +?
So the question remains, should you leave Facebook or Twitter for Google Plus? The short answer in my opinion, is Heck NO! If you are happy using what you are using, then there probably isn't anything that Google is offering today that is going to rock your world in a way that Facebook, or twitter can't. Facebook has something like 750 million users, and currently Google might have 200,000. If you are into Tech, you might find quite a bit going on, because the user base right now is largely tech people. If that isn't your thing, you'll probably find yourself a lot lonely. But Google does offer an excellent interface and it's way of managing your lists is really, really slick. I see a slow migration and adaptation of the Google + service. I'm thinking that if Google really is activating 500,000 Android phones a day worldwide, using your Gmail address, then you will automatically be tied into the Google + eco-system. You are going to see that black bar across anything that is tied to Google services. That bar will have your Name on it. And if you are already using several of Google's other services, then you will find it much more natural to land within the social Google. But for most, people didn't go to Facebook because Facebook was so awesome. They went to Facebook, because practically everyone they know is on Facebook! Until that changes, I don't see Facebook drying up, like MySpace did! But I do feel that Google right now offers a very well executed alternative to Facebook. It's going to get better. It's going to be tied to Google search. It's going to suck you in . . . . . ..
Add ons are already appearing to allow a person to post on Google's plus and it sends to Facebook and Twitter. Twitter clients like Tweet deck and Hoot suite will add the ability to post to Google +. It's going to take some time, but I believe that Google + stands a very good chance of unseating Facebook as the King of Social.
Buds who Blog