Yesterday, Google's VP of Product Management, +Bradley Horowitz, sat down with founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media, +Tim O'Reilly, to discuss Google+, its future, and where it's headed. You can watch the hour-long video here:
I wasn't able to find a transcript for this video, but O'Reilly has helpfully rounded up some of the more interesting points.
- They are aware of the real name/pseudonym issue, and acknowledge that it's kind of messy right now. They've admitted that some people are getting incorrectly flagged and suspended, such as +Violet Blue, and they're working on providing a way for people to be anonymous on Google+. Horowitz points out that he does use a pseudonym (elatable), and he understands their concerns.
- Facebook announced changes yesterday that seem directly inspired by Google+, and Horowitz views this as a good thing: "That's another impact that Google+ can have on the world: raising the bar of what the expectations and standards around something like privacy should be."
- Google will open up more APIs, and this has been its intention from the start. They'll be doing this over time, and in stages.
- Minors will eventually be able to use and access Google+. Currently Google+ users must be at least 18 to use the service.
- Hangouts might extend beyond 10 people, and there might be some experimentation with the limits. One of the user suggestions Horowitz seemed to like was debate-style hangouts, where individuals get timed slots to speak.
- Threaded comments are "probably a good idea".
- Google+ users may eventually be able to send their posts to another service, like Twitter. Currently you can sync Google+ to Facebook and Twitter with unofficial Chrome extensions.
Did Horowitz answer your concerns about Google+? Do you think that Google+ is headed in the right direction?
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5 Comments
hmm...interesting. i'm not so sure about the threaded comments. they can be kind of a pain to follow.
Interesting. Yes, Google+ is still beta, but the fact remains that the masses aren't flocking. It is a tech nerd chatter class product. I'm anxious to see if they can truly compete with Facebook in terms of membership numbers.
Tom Anderson had an interesting G+ post today in which he compared it to the beginning of Twitter, which also started out as a "tech nerd chatter class product". The draw is in the content created by people who are actually on G+. So we'll see.
I think Google is taking the fight to Facebook after such a long duration watching their counterparts enjoy most of the social gains. It is surely going to be a tough battle since they are both internet giants. Hope at the end of things we the users will emerge as the eventual gainers.
That's my hope, too!
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