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Google+ Isn’t Going Away

bits.blogs.nytimes.com

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Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#61

Post by ellyagg »

joebadmo wrote: post #43
timr wrote: post #33

"Instead, Google+ is a social layer that has always been intended to sit on top of the company’s flagship product: search." Flash back to an anonymous Stanford office, circa 1996, where two ambitious graduate students are sitting in front of a pile of lego servers: Larry: "Hey Sergey...you know what the world needs? A place where people can share cat photos with their friends." Sergey: "Oh, Larry...how many times hav…

It seems clear to me that the author meant "always" wrt the inception of G+, not the inception of search. So your snark, while amusing, is misplaced.

That would seem to be true, as thinking otherwise is quite foolish of course. However, the very next paragraph is:

"Sure, Google hopes to build a social network that competes with Facebook, Twitter and other social services, but that is not the main reason the company has put so many resources behind Google+. Instead, Google+ is a social layer that has always been intended to sit on top of the company’s flagship product: search."

What? "Google+ is a social layer that has always been intended to sit on top of the company's flagship product: search" just exactly as long as they decided to "build a social network that competes with Facebook, Twitter and other social services". He is somehow trying to sleight-of-hand away the causal relationship here. If Google+ fails to rival Facebook and Twitter as a social network, it might still turn out ok somehow, but it will doubtlessly be considered a failure internally and externally.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#62

Post by fberger »

Jd wrote: post #22

This is a bit far afield. The most likely prospect for G+ is that it becomes a social network for the more technically inclined while Facebook remains the social network for all -- a bit like the differentiation between reddit and digg. The main reason is not something great that Google is doing, however, but the immense dislike that many have for Facebook. Facebook, of course, is sucking in all data it can get acces…

It's interesting you're mentioning reddit. In my personal use, G+ actually started competing with with reddit.

G+'s what's hot section resembles pretty much the image subreddit at this point content-wise, but the browsing experience is better since most content is displayed inline and I can easily navigate it with j/k.

Now they just have to figure out how you can get hot content for certain categories. Of course it's missing the anonymity of the reddit community, so the content will probably never be on par.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#63

Post by robryan »

badclient wrote: post #58
bitskits wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I respectfully disagree. Was your expectation that G+'s user-base would eclipse FB after 5 months? I don't think that's realistic (really going out on a limb here). By that metric you could have said the same thing about FB in the early days when MySpace had all the users. Clearly, over time, people moved to the better product. If you want to comment on the rate of adoption, that's one thing, but lets compare apples…

I don't care about the user-base numbers. All I care about is engagement. Facebook had crazy engagement even when they had 1000 members. When they had 10M, over 50% of the users were logging in daily. Google now has 40M users and yet they refuse to release engagement numbers.

Facebook had great engagement early on because all the early users were in the same social circles. Wouldn't surprise me at all that 1000 users at the same college as me would result in more usage as opposed to 40 million users scattered across the world.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#64

Post by badclient »

robryan wrote: post #63
badclient wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care about the user-base numbers. All I care about is engagement. Facebook had crazy engagement even when they had 1000 members. When they had 10M, over 50% of the users were logging in daily. Google now has 40M users and yet they refuse to release engagement numbers.

Facebook had great engagement early on because all the early users were in the same social circles. Wouldn't surprise me at all that 1000 users at the same college as me would result in more usage as opposed to 40 million users scattered across the world.

I chalk that up as a deadly blunder on Google's part.

No one forced google to just open up G+ to the entire world. I feel they botched the launch of G+ by allowing scattered masses to join instead of totally nailing smaller groups like how Facebook did.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#65

Post by bitskits »

badclient wrote: post #58
bitskits wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I respectfully disagree. Was your expectation that G+'s user-base would eclipse FB after 5 months? I don't think that's realistic (really going out on a limb here). By that metric you could have said the same thing about FB in the early days when MySpace had all the users. Clearly, over time, people moved to the better product. If you want to comment on the rate of adoption, that's one thing, but lets compare apples…

I don't care about the user-base numbers. All I care about is engagement. Facebook had crazy engagement even when they had 1000 members. When they had 10M, over 50% of the users were logging in daily. Google now has 40M users and yet they refuse to release engagement numbers.

"All I care about is engagement"

I am not following. So if a site has 10 or 1000 users who are all engaged (maybe a community soccer forum or something), it's a success, but if it has 40M+ with an engagement that is unknown, it's dead? I am not convinced.

IMO, you can't simply disregard user-base and growth speed. Those numbers matter.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#66

Post by robryan »

badclient wrote: post #64
robryan wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook had great engagement early on because all the early users were in the same social circles. Wouldn't surprise me at all that 1000 users at the same college as me would result in more usage as opposed to 40 million users scattered across the world.

I chalk that up as a deadly blunder on Google's part. No one forced google to just open up G+ to the entire world. I feel they botched the launch of G+ by allowing scattered masses to join instead of totally nailing smaller groups like how Facebook did.

I think they nailed a single group, the already fairly well connected tech and startups people. This also dragged along those interested in these people although they get less value from it as it's more of a Twitter like following medium unless lots of people are putting you in their circles.

Google certainly have the resources to nail more smaller groups, it's just not the way they operate as this doesn't scale well.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#67

Post by badclient »

bitskits wrote: post #65
badclient wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care about the user-base numbers. All I care about is engagement. Facebook had crazy engagement even when they had 1000 members. When they had 10M, over 50% of the users were logging in daily. Google now has 40M users and yet they refuse to release engagement numbers.

"All I care about is engagement" I am not following. So if a site has 10 or 1000 users who are all engaged (maybe a community soccer forum or something), it's a success, but if it has 40M+ with an engagement that is unknown, it's dead? I am not convinced. IMO, you can't simply disregard user-base and growth speed. Those numbers matter.

This discussion is specifically about facebook vs. G+; not a random site with 1,000 users.

We know that both sites have achieved significant user-base. We also know that one of those sites has crazy engagement and that it's had crazy engagement for a long time. That site is facebook. We know that the other site has 40+M members but publishes no engagement metrics and when pushed, avoids questions about engagement. It is not a stretch to assume from this that their engagement is not optimal. It is safe to say that facebook wins the engagement war.

The common counterargument is "but G+ only launched few months ago." To this, I counter that few months into facebook's launch, their engagement was very high.

The next common argument is that "but G+ got 40M+ members in few months." To this I say that the 40+M number says very little about G+ and says much about the Google search engine. As an example, I'd argue Google can launch a fictitious service and get tens of millions of signups for it by linking to it from google.com.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#68

Post by sherwin »

badclient wrote: post #35
Kylekramer wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a guess: engagement metrics of a 4.5 month old site are pretty pointless. And since Google+ is clearly not in the Facebook ballpark of usage, it would only reflect badly on Google. So why should Google release them? If you think not reaching Facebook-like status or denting Facebook in 4.5 months means Google+ is dead as a Facebook competitor, what could have Google done in that amount of time that would have m…

facebook always had crazy engagement. From the time they had 1000 users to millions of users.

But there's another factor at play here. Many of Facebook's early users didn't have anything else to engage with -- facebook filled a hole. That's not the case with G+: most users already have facebook so they're trying to

So like Kylekramer mentioned: G+ engagement might be lower (and that's why they're not releasing figures) but engagement for an early stage social network competing against a dominant product is not a good metric of long term product quality. Users will choose the better product, over time.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#69

Post by badclient »

robryan wrote: post #66
badclient wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I chalk that up as a deadly blunder on Google's part. No one forced google to just open up G+ to the entire world. I feel they botched the launch of G+ by allowing scattered masses to join instead of totally nailing smaller groups like how Facebook did.

I think they nailed a single group, the already fairly well connected tech and startups people. This also dragged along those interested in these people although they get less value from it as it's more of a Twitter like following medium unless lots of people are putting you in their circles. Google certainly have the resources to nail more smaller groups, it's just not the way they operate as this doesn't scale well…

I disagree that they have nailed any group. For me, nailing a group would mean that group ditching their competitor. Yet, I can't name a single Valley friend of hundreds who has ditched facebook for Google+. Now, I can name you dozens who have a G+ account and have tinkered with it. But that is hardly "nailing" it.

I think you actually nailed it: google doesn't know how to scale social because social doesn't scale the same way as most other products. Facebook scaled growth in a very methodical manner from university to university and later country to country.

Re: Google+ Isn’t Going Away

#70

Post by badclient »

sherwin wrote: post #68
badclient wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

facebook always had crazy engagement. From the time they had 1000 users to millions of users.

But there's another factor at play here. Many of Facebook's early users didn't have anything else to engage with -- facebook filled a hole. That's not the case with G+: most users already have facebook so they're trying to So like Kylekramer mentioned: G+ engagement might be lower (and that's why they're not releasing figures) but engagement for an early stage social network competing against a dominant product is no…

but engagement for an early stage social network competing against a dominant product is not a good metric of long term product quality

Absolutely disagree. I think user growth metrics is a bad metric for a new product but engagement is the perfect metric when gauging product quality.

A large media campaign can pump up registrations--just like linking to G+ from the google.com homepage did. But it won't pump up engagement.

In contrast, organic growth like facebook's early days means smaller user-base but if the product is good, more engagement than the competitor. And let's not forget, in 2006 no one in the Valley or media was talking much about facebook. It was all about celebrating MySpace.

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