So, I have been holding on to my Google Plus (G+) account for almost three weeks now. Waiting for people I know to join me in Google heaven. But guess what... I'm still waiting.
I have of course already connected with the ususal tech crowd in there, but family and friends haven't joined the new Google service? And I doubt if they ever will.
I am aware that it's still a beta version we are looking at. Still, I have a hard time seeing this new service take off even out of beta. It is slightly better designed than facebook, has some neat features that are a little spunkier than Twitter and seems to be ideal for the same sort of professional networking that Linkedin was designed for. Still I question whether G+ will become a smash hit with the general internet crowd for the simple reason that G+ is not introducing radically new functionality that people cannot do without. There is no built-in killer App so to speak! So, why would users move their communicational activities to an entirely new turf, like G+, where on top of it all, they will also have to get acquainted with a new UI?
As I see it G+'s main attraction point is that it integrates your social network with your mail and other Google services. But for people who don't use Gmail, Docs or similar services this is not really a selling point. Another feature that has been touted as a G+ forte is the possibillity to establish numerous networks within G+, a.k.a. the circle system. This feature is admittedly elegantly implemented in G+, but I am sure that facebook is already hard at work to come out with a similar feature (In fact Facebook already has a sifting functionality, it is just not that usable).
Don't get me wrong. This post is not intended to put down G+. I am all for competition and efforts to compete with the Facebooks and Twitters of this world. And it may very well be that I am totally not seeing where this is going. After all, the battle has just begun and the contestants may change strategy many times down the road. If I am off in my prediction, I promise I will be the first to post it on G+ :-)