Google+:  What You Need to Know

“Ain’t nobody on this joint” declared my sister Meredith Leonard when asked her opinions on Google +.

It’s surely a problem for the masses, used to Facebook with nearly everyone they know on it.  My 82 year old grandmother is on Facebook now, in fact.  (Which made my 30 year old cousin Hal delete his account, explaining “if Gammies is on it, I’m not!”)

But back to Google+.   Right now, for most people, there just aren’t enough people on it, despite the many ways to get an invitation.   News articles abound about how there may already be upwards of 10 million users, but my list still shows only a paltry 20 people in my network.  That makes playing around with Google+ difficult, to say the least.

There are some awesome features though.

 

Things I like:

1.  The ‘hangout.’  This is video chat with up to 10 people, and I must admit it was really fun- and super easy.  You can watch youtube videos together too, which would have been great except we had no luck with it- must be one of the quirks Google is still working out.

2. The privacy settings.  You’ve probably heard a lot about it, and I have to say it’s pretty great. You put people in your network into circles as soon as you add them to your network- a circle for “Friends” “Acquaintences” “Family” etc, and you can add people to multiple circles – see the screen shot below.  Then, when you post something to your wall, you can choose which circles to share with.  And, best of all, no one knows which circle you put them into.

3.  The integration with Google search (obviously.)  So, the Google+ equivalent to FB’s ‘like’ is a + button.  You will have seen these on your Google searches too.  Obviously, at some point the amount of +’s a website receives is going to factor into Google’s ranking algorithm, just as FB likes already do.  The difference is, anyone can +1 a website, not just people in Google+.   Awesome.

4.  It’s easy. Really, there isn’t too steep of a learning curve – after spending about 10 minutes, aforementioned sister was able to ‘hangout’ with us even though she isn’t very tech savvy.

 

Things I don’t like:

1.  The terms of service. Essentially, Google owns all the content you post, royalty free.   If you’re a professional photographer, for example, you might want to think twice before posting your photos.

2.  Lack of friends on there, as discussed above.

…really, that’s about it.  Check it out for yourself- need an invitation?  Just let me know in the comments!

POSTED:  Tuesday, July 13, 2011.