Google Plus Preparing To Take Off

Google Plus Soon To Launch

Bradley Horowitz, a Vice President of Product Management said in a statement to the New York Times, “In real life, we have walls and windows and I can speak to you knowing who’s in the room, but in the online world, you get a ‘Share’ box and you share with the whole world.”  The privacy challenges that users face on social media platforms like Facebook seem like they are about to be answered with a real solution in Google Plus.  Both media and potential Google Plus users are clamoring for more information.  This morning, Google Plus was among the top discussions on Twitter.  For a time, it was the top discussion.  Google has a Twitter account devoted solely to Google Plus.

Google’s new social network, Google Plus, is about to launch.  The open date has not yet been made official, but the search engine giant claims it can provide answers for social media users’ security concerns.  The name of the new product is Google+ or Google Plus.  Search enthusiasts may be both tickled and aggravated to notice that, in the Google Adwords keyword tool, one cannot search on symbols as a part of one search term like “Google+” yet one can search for something like “$5 gifts.”  As is par for the course, Google is keeping certain things under wraps.  Instead, if one searches for Google Plus, there will be results.  That interesting bit aside, Google Plus stands to capture a large share of the social media market if it is able to do what it claims to do, and that is to allow users to compartmentalize their online presences the same way they do in real life.

Google Plus Is Not Facebook

Mashable.com more succinctly describes Google Plus’s capabilities here:  “The search giant’s new social project will be omnipresent on every Google product, thanks to a complete redesign of the Google navigation bar. The familiar gray bar at the top of every Google page will turn black, and come with several new options for accessing your Google+ profile, viewing notifications and instantly sharing content at any time. The notification system is similar to how Facebook handles notifications, complete with a red number that increases with each additional notice.”  This is reminiscent of Facebook’s user interface, but here is where the likeness ends.  The differences are found in the details.  One feature is called Circles: users can have circles for professional life, personal life, and for every area in-between.  They’ll be able to share videos, pictures, etc. inside of another feature called Sparks.  And with a feature called Hangouts, users can share their locations and meet with people face to face.  Google says Hangouts is the “next best thing” to teleportation.  Business owners may also find that they have a robust and secure social and professional solution.  Many hope Google Plus is able to live up to Google’s confident claims.

In today’s article, the reader learned that Google has created a social media platform that claims to be intuitive to how people actually live.  Readers also learned that Facebook users complain of security issues and being unable to compartmentalize portions of their social media experience.  Google Plus has the potential to handle those concerns and offer a more customizable and secure environment for both social users and for business users.  Finally the reader learned that while Google Plus is not yet completely open, the release date is close enough that they are building significant buzz about the impending launch.