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Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

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Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#171

Post by zmmmmm »

akennberg wrote: post #92

Google tried social without a real name policy (aka Buzz) and it didn't work. Google+ has better content.

I don't know how you can compare them. G+ has had a massive support from being tied into every other product, in some cases taking features people already use and making G+ mandatory for continuing to use them. Not to mention getting tied to search such that not having a G+ presence could significantly adversely affect your SEO. Buzz certainly had its problems but it doesn't mean G+ was the right way, or that real names had anything to do with the difference.

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#172

Post by kkotak »

A couple of months back I gave my feedback to Vic about how G+ is in a limbo zone between Facebook and Twitter, and that the needs of none of the use cases are met on G+. In his sincere attempt in trying to do his share of keeping the conversation vibrant on G+, Vic would (bad call, in my opinion) post pictures of his kids for thousands of his followers to see and comment on. I think this is where the non-clarity of the platform emerges. First of all, why would you post personal pictures of your family for thousands of strangers to see and comment on? And what do you do with the responses you get? Are you going to read/respond to all? What's the point of someone saying 'awww' or asking you a personal question, to which a response is not really warranted - as the askers are complete strangers. A lot of people follow others on G+ to get professional insights (as in this case) and Vic's usage of the platform as an example confuses the value proposition. My 2c.

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#173

Post by zmmmmm »

saidajigumi wrote: post #34

> Former CEO Eric Schmidt admitted in an interview at the D conference in 2011 that he missed the boat on the rise of identity on the Internet. > “I clearly knew that I had to do something, and I failed to do it,” he said. “A CEO should take responsibility. I screwed up.” I think Eric screwed up in a deeper way that this quote admits. Google+ came up at a time of broader dissatisfaction with other social networks, pa…

I completely agree with you, but don't forget one other hugely important decision wrt to G+ that was controversial at the time: the refusal to release a full fledge API. To this day, the only real client for Google+ is the one made by Google. We've all come to accept it at this point, but back then Google was a company entirely built around the concept of APIs for all their services. No matter what the service, you could integrate with it. G+ was really the first time ever that they said "no, API for you".

Had Google skated around the identity issue AND enabled an ecosystem of 3rd party APIs similar to how Twitter developed, I think G+ would own the entire social network ecosystem by now. Instead, they've got a small piece of the pie, which some will claim is more valuable because it is full of "real identities" and completely controlled by Google, but to my mind is far less value because it intersects only a tiny cross section of society who use it.

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#174

Post by Macha »

eitland wrote: post #164
saidajigumi wrote: post #34

> Former CEO Eric Schmidt admitted in an interview at the D conference in 2011 that he missed the boat on the rise of identity on the Internet. > “I clearly knew that I had to do something, and I failed to do it,” he said. “A CEO should take responsibility. I screwed up.” I think Eric screwed up in a deeper way that this quote admits. Google+ came up at a time of broader dissatisfaction with other social networks, pa…

The easy nym fix is to create a "page" with your handle. The "page" can post, comment on YouTube etc. Not heavily advertised though, I only became aware of it when I had to give up my old YouTube account. You can easily switch between main account and nym account and you only need one password.

This was created a few months after they got forceful about merging people's YT and G+ accounts (maybe one month before they turned off non-G+ comments?)

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#175

Post by Andrex »

acomjean wrote: post #67
bane wrote: post #56

IMHO Google+'s principle problem is that it's multiple efforts all under the same name umbrella. This is confusing to users and seems to have been confusing to Google. It's a longer-than-twitter public broadcast messaging system/social network/photo sharing/single sign-on/half a dozen other things. There's some great ideas in there. Having a subscription style feed of people I want to follow, and their long-form post…

>IMHO Google+'s principle problem is that it's multiple efforts all under the same name umbrella. This is confusing to users and seems to have been confusing to Google. Totally agree with this. I made some effort and still can't figure out where photos I post to google+ go. I used to use the picassa page which was pretty good about making albums and sharing, now I just use Flickr.

plus.google.com/photos//albums/posts

?

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#176

Post by etfb »

Definition of unintended consequences: I don't instantly recognise the names Eric Schmidt, Larry Page or whoever the other guy is -- I have to look them up, and to be honest I keep mixing up Larry Page and Larry Wall. But I know Vic Gundotra, because he's the wanker who pushed the real names policy and made Google+ the laughing stock among my various communities. "I am a Google employee who likes donuts", indeed!

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#177

Post by wpietri »

gwillen wrote: post #153
kibwen wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In addition to being safe, understandable, and wrong, it was completely out of touch. Did nobody stop to think why people would ever elect to use MetalHead444 over their real name in the first place? The only explanation I can fathom was that it was a decision motivated by engineers and marketers rather than by anyone genuinely concerned about user experience.

The engineers -- the ones down in the trenches -- practically revolted over it. The decision was purely from On High, i.e. managerial. It came down from the highest levels.

And that right there strikes me as a symptom of a deep problem.

I think the best use of executives is to support people in the trenches, because they're closest to the actual work. That support can include thoughtful questioning, advising, and mentoring. But when it becomes controlling, it often gets ugly.

I just happened to chat today with a guy who built a large and successful construction company up from nothing. He said that his philosophy was always to hire good people and support them. Eventually it was running well enough that he got bored with it and sold it to the employees. He's now starting an incubator for manufacturing businesses because for him the fun part is helping people get things going. I think he'll be successful, because handing down decisions on high is entirely uninteresting to him.

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#178

Post by dragonwriter »

bradbeattie wrote: post #103
cookiecaper wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, circles mandate additional cognitive load. They should've been implemented such that each user had 2-3 circles max, like "Work", "Friends", and "Family", and it was almost always invisible (meaning you'd almost always share with all). Prompting the user each time they want to post something and making them choose from their 8-10 circles greatly increases the friction of posting.

That, and the decision is one-sided. Say I want to post something publicly about some new technology. Do I post it publicly and have it go into my family's feeds where it will be considered akin to spam? What if one of my friends actually _is_ interested in new tech but I don't know it? I get that it would be an added layer of indirection, but to allow each user to have multiple subject personas for posting and let o…

> but to allow each user to have multiple subject personas for posting and let others subscribe to said personas might have been more useful.

Don't Pages let you do that?

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#179

Post by Tloewald »

Reminds me of the post on "Mac Pravda" after Steve Jobs shitcanned the Newton division. The Google+ version would go something like this:

"Maximum Leader Page declares total victory of Google+. Workers to report to railyard at dawn for reassignment."

Re: Google+ Head Vic Gundotra Leaving Company

#180

Post by georgeecollins »

encoderer wrote: post #46
saidajigumi wrote: post #34

> Former CEO Eric Schmidt admitted in an interview at the D conference in 2011 that he missed the boat on the rise of identity on the Internet. > “I clearly knew that I had to do something, and I failed to do it,” he said. “A CEO should take responsibility. I screwed up.” I think Eric screwed up in a deeper way that this quote admits. Google+ came up at a time of broader dissatisfaction with other social networks, pa…

My impression was that G+ was stymied by a bad go-to-market strategy. I'm sure the real names issue didn't help, but I'm not certain it had the impact you're suggesting. Their go to market strategy was essentially the same as the Chinese government-run construction companies that build an entire city from farmland, cut the ribbon and expect a stampede. Getting it right is complicated and I couldn't do it justice in a…

I think that is really smart and makes a lot of sense. Facebook started out by servicing a niche, Twitter was used by tech nerds.
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