Aside from the awkward name Google's new FB knockoff has some interesting features. However, I don't see much here that FB couldn't immediately mimic.

QuoteGoogle's Facebook Competitor, The Google+ Social Network, Finally Arrives

Google's long expected second shot at taking on Facebook in the social networking space has arrived in the form of the Google+ Project. It has some interesting twists on the social networking model but is far from a Facebook-killer.

Anyone get an invite?

I really tried to watch the video on that page as this looks pretty interesting.  Just couldn't do it though - it made me nauseous. Us brits are just not bred to cope with that level of sickly fake emotion.  I need to punch a puppy or something to restore balance - back soon.

I think the new feature that interests me the most is the ability to segment your friends into groups and target stuff at particular groups.

I think this has real potential - of course Facebook can copy it easily, and hopefully they will, but we do need an alternative to Facebook even if it is Google.

Hopefully the 'communication targeted at defined groups' thing will spread to other products if it works well. I would love to see it incorporated into forum software for example.

Being unable to group people is biggest frustration with Facebook - Zuckerberg has been anti this from the start - saying that the way facebook works means you can no longer pretend to be one person to friends and another to colleagues - the world gets to see the real you, we become more honest  (at least that's what i read http://www.amazon.com/Facebook-Effect-Inside-Company-Connecting/dp/1439102120/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1309341464&sr=1-1)

I want an alternative to facebook but I really don't want it to be google.
I'd prefer just facebook over Google ruling that space as well.

Trying to grab an invite, anyone here have one?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/28/google-plus-google-features_n_886189.html#s299824&title=Google_Timeline

No invites
Just lots of crap reviews
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/jun/29/google-plus-review

QuoteThe Scores

User experience: 2/10 The beginning process – having to fill in long profiles, bad photo experience – is appalling.

Circles: 5/10 This could be a lot smarter if it were to offer people based on how often you email back and forth with them. People who only email you are obviously not "friends". Google should be smart enough with algorithms to figure this out. The dashboard used to control can easily become too complex.

Hangout: 6/10 — though there's a lot more potential in this. Used corporately, it could be something that would displace Skype in companies, especially those which have already adopted Google Apps.

Sparks: 3/10 Almost useless at present: there's no sense that it's about news, or anything.

Overall: 4/10 Not as bad as Buzz – which ignored privacy altogether – and Circles is a clever idea. But "being social" isn't just about involving lots of people in things. It's also about getting out of the way. The irony is that Google's biggest product, its search page, is a classic of simple design. But everything else it does becomes too complicated. Google+ might work better if it tried to do less, and then built it up.

Time will tell, but if I were offered the choice of this or Facebook, I'd take Facebook. But I'd take Twitter's simplicity and speed over both.

I think I'm most interested in the 'cold start' aspect of things, eventhough they have essentially the eyes of the world on them.

Btw the twitter comment I find stunningly stupid. It's like comparing a tv to a spoon. Of course you like twitter, you moron, there is like 2 things you can do there.

>there is like 2 things you can do there.

And that's when it's not overloaded.

If even half of that review is accurate, how the hell could the fuck things up so badly?

It beggars belief

I'm with GerBot.  Google already knows too much about me.

It seems that invites should be easy to get - http://searchengineland.com/how-those-in-google-can-invite-others-83763

Just got an invite....will let you know how it is

Just found this http://twitter.com/#!/mathewi/status/86281196425846784

Google social czar Vic Gundotra just said they have shut down the Google+ invitation system for awhile due to "insane demand"

Quote from: agerhart on June 30, 2011, 05:57:49 AM
Just got an invite....will let you know how it is

Hook us up!