A Brand New Player
There’s a new kid on the block. He’s carrying with him a box of shiny new toys. You might trust this kid, because you already know his parents. He always wears that 4-colored t-shirt, and that weird badge that says “I’m feeling lucky”.
That new kid, the one with the shiny new toys and the 4-colored t-shirt1, is Google’s latest invention. His name?
Google+.
Just a few days ago, Google launched an apparently new way to socialize on the web2. It’s just like those other over-hyped social networking sites, but with a bit of Google-Awesomeness™ mixed in. Google+ (Google Plus as it’s pronounced) will include the ability to share “what you’re doing now” plus five other new social ‘experiences’. Now, the question that comes in mind is this: “What’s the difference between Facebook (or other social websites) and Google+?”
Google basically controls every known website in the internet, and just like Facebook, it is being used by millions of people, around the world. That means, anyone who knows Google, will know Google+, and if Google does it right, sign-ups will be instantaneous and easy. You also might say, “Google doesn’t have those cool apps and games like Facebook does!” But as I have mentioned earlier, they control every known website in the interwebs, and as easy as giving you the link, you can link these 3rd-party webapps right into Google+.
Numbers don’t only make a point on why Google just made Facebook “The New Myspace”, because Google+ comes with some awesome features you don’t normally see (I think) on other social networking websites. In Google+, they’ve created a feature called “Circles”, where you group some of your friends into smaller, topic-driven friendship circles. There’s another feature in Google+ called “Hangouts”, and I don’t really understand the concept, but I think it’s when one of your buddies is online, browsing Google+, you can quickly start a video chat session with that person and the same goes for everyone else that’s online and browsing Google+, much like Skype’s conference call feature, but it’s in-browser. There were also minor features included in Google+, and those were instant photo uploads and a group messaging service called ‘Huddle’.
It may sure sound like an awesome idea, whatever Google+ is truly meant to be, but not all of it is fun and rainbows. Google+ is invite-only, so that means, you just have to wait until you brag about being a part of this Google thing.