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Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

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Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#631

Post by [deleted] »

JohnBooty wrote: post #581
fipple wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it hard to believe the quote? This has been the MO of mass entertainment since the gladiators fought the lions.

Yeah. I'd defy anybody to think critically about Facebook for five minutes and not come to that conclusion. > This has been the MO of mass entertainment since the gladiators fought the lions. Absolutely. Lots of early proto-social media companies were already doing things like that back in the 90s. Like when AOL was king and "You've Got Mail!" was a household catchphrase and featured in their marketing. They knew tha…

[deleted]

Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#633

Post by kriro »

I want to applaud Google's general philosophy of "try stuff, shut it down if it doesn't work" but I do wonder if this isn't bad for the brand. They've been pretty "ruthless" when it comes to shutting down things that some people still use (or at least that's the image).

I think in the back of their minds, possibly subconsciously, people like me probably make decisions against other technology they provide even if it is in a completely different category and pretty much never going to shut down.

For example, I'm not sure I haven't decided against their cloud services because my subconscious remembered the reader being shut down and thought "they better not shut down some part of the infrastructure I rely on".

Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#634

Post by mnsc »

joejerryronnie wrote: post #593
mortdeus wrote: post #538

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He isn't the only person who talks about the dopamine driven feedback loops. Chamath Palihapitiya, who was one of the first engineers at facebook, talks about how they all used to gather in meeting rooms and have intense back and forth discussions on how they actually build this thing so that the entire world wouldn't be able to resist adopting it. He talks about how at the time they really didn't foresee the forebod…

Yeah, I see lots of early hires of the tech giants bemoaning the monsters they've created. They are very concerned about the negative societal impacts of their former employers, but not quite concerned enough to give back the millions of dollars they earned peddling these products.

They will use those millions (or at least part of one of those millions) to create "An Initiative" along with an app or two to somehow combat the monsters. Of course that will fail but their conscience will be cleared. But more importantly, they will be able to think that their blood money is now normal money and they can live and die peacefully.

Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#635

Post by stanmancan »

reaperducer wrote: post #570
stanmancan wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Big companies typically don't go after small niches. There are so many of them available they can't possibly pursue them all, because ultimately you don't know which one will take off. The book The Innovator's Dilemma focuses on this.

Big companies typically don't go after small niches. Big companies go after niches all the time. Many microbrews are owned by massive multi-national breweries. Huge drug companies chase niches every day. Giant food companies release ethic niche foods every month. Whomever told you that there isn’t big money in niches or that they’re not worth going after is someone you should stop taking advice from.

It very much depends on the market. This is the reason why Seagate and Western Digital aren’t big names in the SSD market. They dominated the mechanical drive market for years (and still do!) but by the time SSDs were worth pursuing, other companies were light years ahead of them.

Google isn’t really in the business of filling small niches. That’s why they kill so many products that have small but passionate user bases. It’s just not worth their time and money so they shut the products down. This is why I can’t see them trying to start with a small social media niche and slowly expand to a bigger market. It’s a great idea; but seems to go against everything they do.

Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#636

Post by mcv »

mcv wrote: post #332

This sucks. The vibrant RPG community on Google+ is in uproar about this and looking for a suitable alternative. (MeWe looks like the most likely candidate at the moment.) Google+ started out as the best social network. Unfortunately Google has taken every opportunity to ruin it, remove popular features, force ill-considered integration, remove that integration once people are used to it. Lately the spam filtering ha…

Besides MeWe, there's also a big push towards Diaspora. Diaspora seems much closer to the Google+ experience, and some people have expressed doubts about MeWe's alt-right ties.

There's a specific Diaspora node for Google+ refugees: https://pluspora.com

Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#637

Post by jliptzin »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #541
mindgam3 wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because social is/was such a fundamental aspect of the human experience. As proven by facebook’s continued explosive growth in the years since Google tried to compete. Not to mention FB’s ability to affect markets, attitudes, and politics at global scale. It would have been better if they had competitors to keep them honest.

Disagree strongly. Lots of categories are a fundamental part of the human experience. No one company can or should try and compete in all of them. I really admire Apple here a lot more than Google. They seem to have a stronger sense of who they are and who they are not.

Whether or not they should have, I applaud Google for at least trying. Facebook needs a real competitor.

Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#638

Post by lowlevel »

gcatalfamo wrote: post #629
mliker wrote: post #626

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There is no way Facebook would ever implement something like this." Except they did in 2011 in response to Google+ by adding Friend Lists, which you can use to filter your News Feed down to stories and news items from just friends in certain lists curated by you. This is still in existence today in 2018.

Yes but it is so hidden and “ancient” that I would be surprised if more than 1% of users actively uses it.

I’ve given up trying to find anything on facebook... I just post a picture once in a while and talk to whoever comments on it.

Re: Shutting Down Google+ for Consumers

#640

Post by gt640k »

JauntTrooper wrote: post #611
yks wrote: post #488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Instead they should have tried to identify a niche where Facebook was failing and build up a loyal core of rabidly passionate users As Google Reader history shows, Google does not care about the passionate users.

I still miss Reader. :( I basically stopped following most blogs when it shut down, and reverted to individual bookmarks.

I wonder if that's in their interest or not
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