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Using Google without a Google+ profile

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Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#191

Post by wstrange »

msandford wrote: post #27
chc wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your system of morality has an astonishingly low bar for "evil" if "requiring a Google+ account for access to a service" qualifies. I don't think something that harmless would go past "somewhat dickish" for most people. If that's evil, what's the word you use for people who kick puppies or otherwise cause harm to the world?

Is outing someone against their will and possibly ruining their life merely "somewhat dickish"? http://www.zdnet.com/article/google-outed-me/ I'm not saying that annoying people by forcing G+/YT integration is evil. But presuming that an annoyance to you is an annoyance to all is faulty.

This seems to be a problem with all social networks.

Why is Google being singled out here?

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#192

Post by arto »

realusername wrote: post #130

Can we talk a bit about Google Groups also ? Dear Google, please do something about Google groups... It's just unusable. Everytime I see a Google groups link I just don't click. The contrast is horrible, the padding is making 3/4 of the screen useless, it takes forever to load, when you click on something it's lagging again... And the worst part in all of this is that people are still using it, please do something ab…

> And the worst part in all of this is that people are still using it, please do something about it...

This probably has to do with the ease of setting up or subscribing to a mailing list with Google Groups, even despite how its usability has devolved. There aren't any free mailing-list services that are as easy to get up and running with--partly, of course, because almost everyone already has a Google account, making it trivial to join a group.

Still waiting for somebody to create a good mailing-list service based on "subscribe with GitHub" (i.e., OAuth) to take this all away from Google and crappy self-hosted Mailman both.

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#193

Post by wstrange »

higherpurpose wrote: post #139
legohead wrote: post #79

This is confusing to me. What IS a "Google Account"? Is it my gmail? That makes no sense to me, it's an email service. A "Google Account" sounds like I work at Google. If you were to tell me I had a "Google Account", I would assume it's Google+. Google messed up when it tried to make some master account with Google+. Maybe everything could be incorporated into one account, but the way they've done it is one of the mo…

Honestly, the whole account "integration" just pisses me off. I want my Gmail account to be separated from my Youtube account and from the Maps account. The main reason (by far) Google unified them is so they they can more easily track everyone across multiple properties.

That is an understandable choice, which Google should respect and enable.

For many others (self included), the account integration is a killer feature.

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#194

Post by reagency »

gherkin0 wrote: post #66
hyperpallium wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why did they need real names anyway? If they build a profile based on your browsing and social graph to show you ads, what does it matter who you actually are, so long as you have those interests? Like a node in a graph being distinguished only by the arcs connecting it.

I think the use of real names was identified as one of the reasons for Facebook's success[1], so they just copied that. [1] http://techcrunch.com/2008/12/17/myspace-quietly-begins-enco...

Real Names policy was the brainchild of a 40-yr-old multi-millionare who was an expert in cultivating his personal brand and image, and knows not donsay anythig embarrassing online.

Why would you care to use Google+ in any other way, he thought.

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#195

Post by reagency »

Pxtl wrote: post #60
mkozlows wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook has, and has long had, a real name policy. If you want a reason why Facebook succeeded and G+ didn't, you'll need something that's actually different between them.

Facebook is a single-purpose social network. It stands alone. Plus is a social platform providing a glue-layer between all the social aspects of Google's services. When you're providing a platform, you can't afford to be opinionated.

Facebook supports messaging, event calendars, photo and videos, blogs (Pages), business listings, geo checkins, a social app platform, and a web identity service....

How is that different in kind from what Google offers to consumers?

Google also offers binary blob data storage/sync, and a phone OS. Is that key?

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#196

Post by [deleted] »

Pxtl wrote: post #60
mkozlows wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook has, and has long had, a real name policy. If you want a reason why Facebook succeeded and G+ didn't, you'll need something that's actually different between them.

Facebook is a single-purpose social network. It stands alone. Plus is a social platform providing a glue-layer between all the social aspects of Google's services. When you're providing a platform, you can't afford to be opinionated.

[deleted]

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#197

Post by redwood »

Mahn wrote: post #183
try_sincerely wrote: post #157

"When we launched Google+, we set out to help people discover, share and connect across Google like they do in real life. " Why can't they for once be honest and say something like: "We wanted to get on the social network train, it did not work out". Just without these corporate lies about "connecting people"

That's not how PR speak works :) And to be fair, Google+ does have a few million users doing their thing there, it won't be displacing Facebook anytime soon but it's not entirely dead weight for them, so whether it worked out or not is relative.

and what a liability those few million are now because they can't get rid of this thing without giving them a way out

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#198

Post by jsprogrammer »

macintux wrote: post #171
marknutter wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it incredibly convenient not to have to log into drive, gmail, maps, youtube, etc. separately. They all work seamlessly together, and I know I sound like a shill for saying so, but I've had nothing but positive experiences with it.

I see the convenience, but that only works if you're willing to bare your soul to Google. If you want to have one identity for YouTube, a different identity for Gmail, and don't want Google to know where you are via Maps, that becomes much more problematic.

Sounds like a good opportunity for a browser that manages your various identities across multiple sites.

Re: Using Google without a Google+ profile

#199

Post by rlu »

great so can I login with my youtube account now? I don't think I ever migrated it to a Google account (despite being asked to like a million times - would always say "later") and now I have no idea how to login to it.
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