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Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

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Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#81

Post by mcburton »

drostan wrote: post #21

I think people exist in circles, but they don't necessarily talk or share in circles. If Google, or anyone, wants to mimic real social interaction, they need to find a way to enable talking to the right people for that moment and that content. Even the closest circles don't work in daily life. Rarely do I think "I'd like to go skiing with 'best friends' or 'school friends'". I'm much more likely to think of who skis,…

You are on the right track IMHO. What is key is that 'best friends' or 'school friends' are highly contingent and ambiguous constructs. They are not fixed, but rather are dynamic through time–people flow in & out of circles for a multitude of reason–which is very hard to operationalize technically. More engineers & techies should at least be familiar and respect more social theory, not because it represents some 'true' representation of how real social interaction works, but more as food for thought when designing social/technical infrastructure(or as we say in the biz sociotechnical ;). I see echos of Erving Goffman, Harold Garfinkel, Anslem Strauss, and Emilie Durkheim in RWW's description of circles.

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#82

Post by michaelchisari »

blhack wrote: post #75
michaelchisari wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same reason you might want to host your own web server instead of using Geocities. And if you don't host your own, the competitive eco-system that's created by federation means you can move your profile between nodes, without losing access to your social network.

I do not understand any of what you just said. I would want to host my own webserver instead of using Geocities because hosting my own webserver means that I can write my website in whatever language I want, and that there is no limitation on what I can use it for (like DB restrictions, or domain restrictions). What is "the competitive ecosystem that's created by federation"? What reason would I ever have for moving…

I would want to host my own webserver instead of using Geocities because hosting my own webserver means that I can write my website in whatever language I want, and that there is no limitation on what I can use it for

And with Appleseed, you can run your own social networking site, theme it how you want, add third party features, build extensions, etc.

"the competitive ecosystem that's created by federation"?

Think of it like email. If you decide you don't want to be on gmail anymore, you move to hotmail or yahoo, or you set up your own server, and since SMTP is federated, you can still email all of your contacts, you're not walled off.

The same principle applies to Appleseed and distributed social networking.

(A "node" is just a social networking website that is compatible.)

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#83

Post by michaelchisari »

rick888 wrote: post #76
michaelchisari wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same reason you might want to host your own web server instead of using Geocities. And if you don't host your own, the competitive eco-system that's created by federation means you can move your profile between nodes, without losing access to your social network.

I've been hearing about Appleseed for at least 5+ years and it's still in obscurity. The problem is that it's just too complicated for the average, non-technically savvy user. Without being able to get the general public to use it, it won't go anywhere.

It's pretty simple to sign up for and use, actually. No more difficult than Facebook. You create an account, upload photos, read newsfeeds, etc. Unless you're talking about setting up your own server, in which case it requires experience with running a LAMP server, and about 5 min to install.

The problem is that it's a volunteer open source project, not that it's difficult to use. Thus, it takes a lot longer time to maturation than it does when you have funding and full time employees.

However, despite being in beta, that we've built up around 200 Appleseed nodes (50 running the latest code), and the main beta test server has around 600 testers, it's not doing too shabby.

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#84

Post by bmelton »

stanleydrew wrote: post #65
nextparadigms wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I usually don't like how every google product is just a subdomain or a folder of the google.com domain. Products with runaway success need to have their own domain. Can you imagine if Facebook was at microsoft.com/facebook? Or Twitter was at google.com/twitter? That would seriously slow down adoption.

Have you considered the cookie implications of every Google product living on a separate domain? We'd have to login so many times.

Gmail.com redirects to mail.google.com, but they own the domain, and I ALWAYS type that in instead of typing mail.google.com.

Picasaweb.com is the same way.

I get your point, and it's not a bad one, generally speaking, but my gmail and picasaweb logins are automatic after I've logged in to any other google service -- I just cleared my entire browser history / passwords / cache etc., to make sure.

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#85

Post by Unseelie »

bvi wrote: post #48
kj12345 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the name "Circles" is awesome. It's agressive and appealing when seen from the perspective of "what do you offer that's better than Facebook", but also generically pleasant if you just encountered it as a product.

I'm positive it'll just be a matter of time before "Sphere" rolls out.

No, because people can't think in 3 dimensional Ven Diagrams.

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#86

Post by Unseelie »

camdykeman wrote: post #45
lachyg wrote: post #2

I think a social network that has the ability for friend groups / circles is way over due. Will be interested to see this!

One problem i could see though is that limiting your sharing to only certain social circles might be too limited for some people. The other day my roommate was upset that I couldn't see some of the pictures he'd been tagged in on FB because I wasn't already friends with the owner of the picture. People like being able to show off their pictures to others and sometimes it seems people want everyone to see a picture, w…

There should certianly be a "you were tagged in these photos, do you want to add them to one of -your- albums" feature. In my experience, my entire album is built from photos someone else has taken. I'd never considered what their privacy settings are doing to my friends viewing....

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#87

Post by [deleted] »

kj12345 wrote: post #16
lachyg wrote: post #2

I think a social network that has the ability for friend groups / circles is way over due. Will be interested to see this!

Yes, the name "Circles" is awesome. It's agressive and appealing when seen from the perspective of "what do you offer that's better than Facebook", but also generically pleasant if you just encountered it as a product.

[deleted]

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#88

Post by [deleted] »

bayareaguy wrote: post #31

A "dot.com" company called eCircles[1,2] took exactly this approach between 1998-2001. They were later sold to Classmates[3]. 1- http://www.pcworld.com/article/9704/join_hands_in_ecircles.h... 2- http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-55246946.html 3- http://books.google.com/books?id=OCRdSXSKZ-AC&pg=PA131&#...

[deleted]

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#89

Post by ern »

orijing wrote: post #67

> We speak to our "friends" all at once, no matter what we might want to say to one group of people or another. And thus we often feel less comfortable than we might saying anything at all. I don't understand. We can do that on Facebook already. In fact, I already do that... I have friend lists, and different people see different statuses depending on context. I don't see the problem Google is trying to solve. I'd be…

I also use Facebook friend lists, and I often post things to my status that are restricted to close friends only. I also restrict Facebook chat using friend groups. The problem is that these friends have no way of knowing that they are the only ones in on the conversation so they feel constrained. Also, most people I know don't bother to segment their friends.

I also group people on Twitter into lists, in the hope that the lists will become useful someday.

Re: Google to Launch Major New Social Network Called Circles, Possibly Today

#90

Post by rick888 »

michaelchisari wrote: post #83
rick888 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been hearing about Appleseed for at least 5+ years and it's still in obscurity. The problem is that it's just too complicated for the average, non-technically savvy user. Without being able to get the general public to use it, it won't go anywhere.

It's pretty simple to sign up for and use, actually. No more difficult than Facebook. You create an account, upload photos, read newsfeeds, etc. Unless you're talking about setting up your own server, in which case it requires experience with running a LAMP server, and about 5 min to install. The problem is that it's a volunteer open source project, not that it's difficult to use. Thus, it takes a lot longer time to…

It may seem easy to you, but it needs to be brain-dead easy for the average user or they won't even waste their time on it. Is there one site people can go to like Facebook and signup? There also needs to be a compelling reason to switch.
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