31–40 of 165 posts
Whatever the current T&Cs says, google can certainly reclaim or start charging for your current plus url, and heck even your google account. Google can do whatever the heck they want, and you really have no recourse.
Here's how it works. The techies create something. The legals come along and say, OK, to release that in the wild it needs some T&Cs that cover our arses for everything and then some, because people keep sueing us. In practice, would Google ever dare invoke this on a large scale? No, you know that. Yes, there should be some transparent process that is undertaken if yours were revoked, but Google only like stuff that…
You forgot the part where the business guys come in and ask why they aren't making money off this and decide to either cancel the service or start charging for it.
I took my name URL but have no plans to publicize it. I don't own it.
Why the phone verification is required to claim a custom URL? Custom URL is a poor incentive to provide Google your phone number.
Seems odd that Google would risk turning me away from Plus simply because I cannot receive texts. Get over it Google, I'm not giving you my cell number. Find another way to verify my identity, I only use practically all of your services and have given you pretty much all of my personal information at one point over the last dozen years.
For this exact reason I registered my own 1-letter URL shortener domain and use it to create my own custom redirects whenever I want without submitting to someone's BS TOS. It's better to promote your own brand than someone else's. Send me email at: g@c.gg :)
Are you selling your own shortener domain you used to create your own short URL's ?
Google+ on the whole seems quite poorly designed from a UX perspective. Most people seem to use Google+ like a blog, but the two column card layout on the desktop (three columns on some Google+ sites) makes it impossible to read posts in chronological order. This is so blazingly obvious, one can only wonder why Google went ahead with this pattern. If the site is optimised for mobile (which seems to be the case), why do they push the same design to desktop?
The way comments open up in a small scrollable panel also makes for a pretty miserable experience on the desktop. As does clicking a tag and having to explore everying from within the constricted space of a card (again why do they push this pattern to desktop users if it's intended for mobile users?)
Can you actually add titles for Google+ posts? It doesn't seem so. This means you redundantly repeat the name of the blog author as the title of every single card/post.
And what's with the bizarre gigantic image at the top of the page that only reveals itself when you scroll to the top? Was this meant to be a delightful surprise feature? It just feels odd.
Finally, there is a button on the left-hand side of the page in the header. It looks like a button, it's shaped like a button. But when you move your mouse pointer over the button, a menu appears automatically (on rollover). If it's meant to be a rollover drop-down menu, then don't make it look like a clickable button. As always with Google and their UX, it's one step forward, two steps back (IMO).
> Many people have the same name. Add a few extra letters or numbers to this URL to get one that is unique for you.
Why would I want yet another "MyName" identifier? How does that help friends and family remember or identify me? What purpose does it serve?
I'm yet another person with a nickname that identifies me all over and has for years, I too own the domain. But Google+ keeps insisting I have my "real name" ... except it's not my real name because I have to add random crap to be unique.
I have no idea why they cling to this.
I don't understand why they call it "custom". More like "assigned".
You can technically apply to make it anything you want, and the set of allowed names should technically be far larger than the set of disallowed ones. But I'm waiting to see if they'll let me take +akkartik rather than +KartikAgaram, so we'll see.
Also, they weren't just allowing people to register any old nickname or brand name. It was probably more about letting people make minor corrections.
For this exact reason I registered my own 1-letter URL shortener domain and use it to create my own custom redirects whenever I want without submitting to someone's BS TOS. It's better to promote your own brand than someone else's. Send me email at: g@c.gg :)
I got curious and checked c.gg and I see it is for sale. Are you selling your own shortener domain you used to create your own short URL's ?
I plan to set it up like my personal "tiny.cc" allowing for vanity urls for easy navigations
For example: