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Why Google+ Failed

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Re: Why Google+ Failed

#111

Post by SamBam »

jrockway wrote: post #35

The ranking system did kind of annoy me. We used G+ heavily inside of Google, and lots of interesting people posted interesting things. As time wore on, I felt like I got less and less of that stuff. A coworker would say "did you see so and so's G+ post" and I would go look for it and not be able to find it until I begged someone a link. I followed them. They followed me. The post had 300 +1s. But I could never see i…

> Twitter seems like it's a place where people shout into the void about how far to the left or right they are.

I restarted my Twitter, and just started following people who post things in interested in that are not politics -- for me, that's maker spaces, education, STEM, etc -- and it's night and day. A much smaller group of people who post interesting things, ask questions, interact, and are generally friendly.

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#112

Post by gravitas »

SamBam wrote: post #106
mattkevan wrote: post #94

The problem with Google+ is that using it felt like work . It had some nice ideas, and was in many ways better than Facebook. But it wasn't fun, and it wasn't somewhere that was pleasant to hang out for long. It also felt like it was solving a problem for Google, but not for its users. I could see how it would be strategic for Google to counter Facebook, and how tying searches into my social graph would result in muc…

They learned the wrong lesson from the Gmail invites. The artificial scarcity of Gmail invites worked better than their wildest dreams. People were selling invites on eBay, trading then, etc. It worked really well to generate buzz. So of course they tried to replicate it. But if you're the only Gmail user among your friends, you can still email them. As you say, if you're the only Google+ user, you have no one to tal…

I really think the author missed this social point, and it's an extremely important one. As a tech nerd, I had fellow tech nerds who had G+ but I was unable to secure an invite, like many others. It was just frustrating and caused people to develop an anti-G+ attitude before they could even get onto the service.

I distinctly recall a wave (lasted about... 2 weeks?) of serious internet hype where many contacts on Facebook saying they wanted to get on G+ to try and and get away from FB, yet could not get an account due to this rollout methodology. It's my personal opinion this was the shot they missed - you don't keep away the early adopters who will bring in their non-tech friends over time.

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#113

Post by echelon »

Perhaps a better approach would be a protocol that allows for complex integrations to be built by the power users, but a simple product for the masses. Twitter before they shut off their API.

Imagine one of these social networks actually had APIs for you to manage contacts, group them, control publishing and consumption, etc. Most people wouldn't interact that way, but the power users would.

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#114

Post by [deleted] »

xamuel wrote: post #78

The decision to name it "Google+" was an epic blunder. You wouldn't ask a girl at a club if she's on "McDonalds+". You wouldn't ask a member of your church if they'd like to connect on "American Airlines Plus". When Facebook was at the height of its coolness (like 2007, 2008), most people didn't even see it as a corporation. It was just its own independent thing. It never would have spread if it were attached at the…

[deleted]

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#115

Post by coldpie »

jrockway wrote: post #35

The ranking system did kind of annoy me. We used G+ heavily inside of Google, and lots of interesting people posted interesting things. As time wore on, I felt like I got less and less of that stuff. A coworker would say "did you see so and so's G+ post" and I would go look for it and not be able to find it until I begged someone a link. I followed them. They followed me. The post had 300 +1s. But I could never see i…

> Twitter seems like it's a place where people shout into the void about how far to the left or right they are.

There's a lot more to Twitter than that. Just don't follow anyone who posts that junk (even if they're real-life friends/acquaintances) and it's actually a pretty nice place to be. If you post interesting stuff and interact with others, you'll gain some followers and be able to have a real conversation, which you will then want to take elsewhere because of the fucking character limit.

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#116

Post by mattkevan »

fyoving wrote: post #100
mattkevan wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feels like the same people responsible for Mircrosoft's product decisions in the 2000s have now all moved to Google, with a slight twist in strategy. When a Microsoft product didn't do well they called it something different and relaunched, hoping no-one realised it was the same old thing – e.g. Zune Music/Xbox Music/MSN Music/Groove Music/Microsoft Store etc. Google now* just kills it and launches something else, so…

I don't mind the killing off of stuff that doesn't catches on it's a mark of dynamism.

It suggests a lack of focus, and gives users a reason to not trust their products. Why should I adopt service n when it's probably going to be shut down in 12-18 months, after the launch of service n+1?

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#117

Post by imgabe »

I think a lot of it came down to their "invite-only" launch. I remember a lot of my friends were excited to try it. Some of us were able to get invites, some weren't. Eventually the people who couldn't get on right away just said "screw it" and went back to Facebook. The rest of us followed because that's where we could interact with everyone and not just the people who happened to get on Google+.

By the time it opened up to everyone, nobody cared anymore. I can't believe somebody thought it would be a good idea to restrict access to a product that depends on network effects to succeed.

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#118

Post by the-rc »

tannhaeuser wrote: post #51
jrockway wrote: post #35

The ranking system did kind of annoy me. We used G+ heavily inside of Google, and lots of interesting people posted interesting things. As time wore on, I felt like I got less and less of that stuff. A coworker would say "did you see so and so's G+ post" and I would go look for it and not be able to find it until I begged someone a link. I followed them. They followed me. The post had 300 +1s. But I could never see i…

I guess it's a fair post-mortem for G+ the product, but I'm personally more interested in what happens to content on G+. For example, Linus Torvalds blogged on it (eg. dead link https://plus.google.com/102150693225130002912/posts/1vyfmNCY... about why he switched away from Suse), and many others as well. The content is why I occasionally went there, and why people outside Google posted there (assuming a big name won'…

It's not static content. It would have been expensive to keep the services running. Not just in terms of computing and storage, but also for the headcount. Speaking of the latter, who would want to work on maintaining a read-only version of a project frozen in time? (The enterprise version will evolve, etc.) I am not even going into the legal implications.

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#119

Post by trevize1138 »

imgabe wrote: post #117

I think a lot of it came down to their "invite-only" launch. I remember a lot of my friends were excited to try it. Some of us were able to get invites, some weren't. Eventually the people who couldn't get on right away just said "screw it" and went back to Facebook. The rest of us followed because that's where we could interact with everyone and not just the people who happened to get on Google+. By the time it open…

Sounds like they were trying to emulate the early days of FB some people pine for where you had to have a .edu email address to sign up. I know a few friend were hopeful that Google+ meant they would no longer see posts from their racist uncle or gullible aunt. Start out with that same kind of exclusivity and hopefully it builds this exclusive mystique so when you open it up to everybody you get a flood. Perhaps the big difference they didn't factor in is FB did this when relatively few people were on social media so they couldn't help but grow whereas Google+ needed to recognize they were trying to enter an already saturated market.

Re: Why Google+ Failed

#120

Post by jimktrains2 »

gravitas wrote: post #112
SamBam wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They learned the wrong lesson from the Gmail invites. The artificial scarcity of Gmail invites worked better than their wildest dreams. People were selling invites on eBay, trading then, etc. It worked really well to generate buzz. So of course they tried to replicate it. But if you're the only Gmail user among your friends, you can still email them. As you say, if you're the only Google+ user, you have no one to tal…

I really think the author missed this social point, and it's an extremely important one. As a tech nerd, I had fellow tech nerds who had G+ but I was unable to secure an invite, like many others. It was just frustrating and caused people to develop an anti-G+ attitude before they could even get onto the service. I distinctly recall a wave (lasted about... 2 weeks?) of serious internet hype where many contacts on Face…

Speaking of wave, Google wave too. Really excellent idea, but if you couldn't collaborate with anyone but yourself (because of invites), you aren't really "collaborating" and all the benefits of wave are lost.
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