The Plus in Google Plus? It’s Mostly for Google • Hacker News Board

Re: The Plus in Google Plus? It’s Mostly for Google

#81

Post by chilldream » Sun, Feb 16, 2014, 12:55 AM UTC

judk wrote: post #16

chilldream wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook has an opt-in mechanism called "signing up for a Facebook account." G+'s equivalent is "signing up for an unrelated service, possibly as long as a decade ago."

How do I use Facebook Chat and Facebook Photos without a Facebook News Feed account, and without Facebook Like buttons recording every web page I visit?

I think the disconnect here is that people don't seem to get that "I voluntarily signed up for a social network" is an important step for a lot of people. It's entirely possible that a lot of people who hate g+ now wouldn't have minded it if it came out of the ether right after Facebook got popular, instead of being retrofitted onto something that already existed and foisted on that userbase above its protests. You can't just unilaterally change the purpose of your site and expect people who liked the old site to automatically like the new one.

FWIW, I also hate Facebook Connect and refuse to use it on principle despite having a Facebook account I voluntarily use.

Re: The Plus in Google Plus? It’s Mostly for Google

#82

Post by chilldream » Sun, Feb 16, 2014, 12:57 AM UTC

spacemanmatt wrote: post #11

chilldream wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook has an opt-in mechanism called "signing up for a Facebook account." G+'s equivalent is "signing up for an unrelated service, possibly as long as a decade ago."

I declined G+ for a while, but eventually pressed a button and consented to convert my accounts. I am not aware of any automatic conversion, especially from 10-year-old accounts. I assure you, my Gmail account is older than that.

Either it stops being optional after some point, or they tricked me into converting vis-a-vis some Dark Pattern (which is if anything even more scummy as far as I'm concerned). My YouTube account is separate from my Gmail account and I can assure you that I never would have added a g+ page to it on purpose given the choice.

Re: The Plus in Google Plus? It’s Mostly for Google

#83

Post by chilldream » Sun, Feb 16, 2014, 1:08 AM UTC

davidnu wrote: post #14

chilldream wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, exactly this. I was fine with my Google Account; now I have a Google Social Networking Boondoggle. And the rare times G+ makes a difference in my use of other services, the net effect has been worse (I'm still not over the YouTube thing)

You should be over the 'Youtube thing'. Many Google services employ commenting/voting/rating etc, handling these in different, separate siloed systems makes no sense. G+ makes a great deal of sense that its detractors are unwilling to admit. As for the Youtube commenting system which all those who want to be derisive about G+ are quick to point to, they fail to mention how Youtube comments weren't that great to begin…

I can assure you that I still follow the same YouTube channels I was following before and my complaints about the comment system are very well-informed. I will concede that comment threading is somewhat better, and it's nice that people can actually post links now, but there's still plenty to hate. Hell, here's just what's annoyed me in the last day:

I can't keep myself signed in. Well, kind of; g+ UI was designed by trolls, so what actually happens is that I appear to be signed in until I actually try to do anything, at which point I'm asked to sign in. Sometimes I even sign in, try to check my notifications, and am asked to sign in again.

Anytime I post a comment "Also post to Google+" is pre-checked. I can't make it unchecked by default.

I have had a YouTube account for years. Since the changeover, I receive more spam from random strangers every week than I did over the rest of the account's lifetime combined. I now also get newsletter spam from YouTube itself (I'm now looking at an email entitled "Well... these love songs are awkward on YouTube", like that is something I would ever want). On the bright side, I clicked the unsubscribe link and unlike the last three times, it didn't throw a server error, so I'll see if it takes.

Despite never flagging any of the above as spam, my Gmail spam filter has started catching my subscription emails as spam. That is, the legitimate communications from YouTube that I specifically asked for are the ones getting killed, as opposed to the scummy newsletters I was autosubscribed to and the new spam vector that is g+.

If this stuff seems minor, keep in mind that it's all the fault of something that I didn't ask for, never wanted, and actively tried to avoid.

Re: The Plus in Google Plus? It’s Mostly for Google

#84

Post by chilldream » Sun, Feb 16, 2014, 1:15 AM UTC

opinali wrote: post #27

jinushaun wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google had an identity layer before G+. Everyone knew that if they signed up for gmail, they had access to calendar and docs. Even if you didn't sign up for gmail first, there was already a concept of a Google account where you activated features like gmail, docs and calendar. G+ plus provides nothing useful, especially since Hangout is a standalone product in people's minds.

Not really. Some products like YouTube used a separate account. Most products had incompatible ToS so any integration was difficult or impossible. Each product that had comments, like YouTube or Blogger, or a concept of marking something as good/bad/favorite/starred/etc., or sharing, did that in a different and incompatible way, etc. The gmail account was only good enough as a basic authentication token for several p…

> Just go to plus.google.com/settings and disable everything and be happy

Until they add more things that are checked by default like that "let any random yahoo email me" feature.

Re: The Plus in Google Plus? It’s Mostly for Google

#85

Post by ZeroGravitas » Sun, Feb 16, 2014, 10:19 AM UTC

tim333 wrote: post #79

r0h1n wrote: post #30

IANAL, but "giving away" billions of dollars of prime ad space to entice businesses to sign up for G+, how is that not predatory pricing? [0] > The company has also pushed brands to join Plus, offering a powerful incentive in exchange — prime placement on the right-hand side of search results, with photos and promotional posts. > “It is literally promotion that money can’t buy,” Mr. Elliott said. “It is something tha…

Predatory pricing is "below-cost pricing allows a dominant competitor to knock its rivals out of the market and then raise prices to above-market levels for a substantial time." It would be hard to argue that G+ is giving away space to knock Facebook out of the market and then charge for G+. Classic predatory pricing is things like British Airways driving Laker Airways bust so they could jack prices on the London NY…

It's the rates on advertising that Google could increase if it knocked out a competitor,