What?
Google+
Ok so you might be tired of hearing about it already. Or, maybe you haven't heard of it yet. Regardless of your status in this thing, it is most certainly a thing. Like planking. Planking's a thing whether you like it or not.
I think I would define a "thing" as something that can be googled. Memes, websites, trends... they are all "things" that can be googled. Google+ can be googled, but it won't get you very far.
You'll arrive at a page that shows you some of the cool stuff that it does, a "demo" if you will, or pictures or video of people who are in the beta... but right now you won't get in without an invite.
I was invited by a friend. I'm not going to pretend that I was "cool enough" to be invited by Google themselves... though Canvas picked me up themselves. I must be only kind of cool. Underground cool. Right then.
So what's the big deal?
"It's just FACEBOOK with Google's FACE on it" - Les, the love of my life, griping about google+
...but... I say... it does more than Facebook. When asked what it is, many peoples first words are "it's like Facebook, but Google made it... and it's got some different stuff."
That doesn't glorify the situation at all.
Facebook will probably catch up and incorporate these features eventually, like how they picked up on a lot of cool Myspace things and Myspace picked up on a lot of Facebook's things... etc.
There's something about originality, though, that makes some people true fans. Like Nintendo fans. Yeah. You guys get it.
Uhoh, it's getting too boring. Picture:
So what's different? Lots of people talk about circles, but I'm going to talk about "hangouts" first. Well + (that's what I'm going to call it. Don't be confused) has these things called "hangouts" that are pretty cool. If you are familiar with "google talk" you know that in your gmail you can chat, and video chat, with anyone who is also on their gmail.This is kind of an extension of that. Now you can video chat with anyone who is on + but not JUST video chat with one person, but with anyone in any particular "circle" that you want. Here's a video where someone "hung out" with iJustine (a popular vlogger on YouTube)
The hangout window has a cool feature where you can watch youtube videos together. It will probably incorporate more cool things that you can share (maybe google docs?) eventually. All these things you see are still in beta. (Which is like... a rough draft.)
Also, there's circles.
"Who CARES? Facebook has GROUPS. Same thing."
Nope.
Groups allow you to only share certain information and photos with certain people, sure. They can also be public or private. However, they are more like message boards. It's like going onto a separate facebook, or a separate newsfeed, to share with these people. Also, people can see that you are in a group, even if they can't see what group you're in. So if you really want to join the group "Pokemon Addicts," or if your friend puts you into that group cuz he likes to share his pokemon stories with you, that's gonna show up on your profile... even if the actual content doesn't.
Or if you make a group called "best friends" then that friend who thinks they are your bestie is gonna be really sad when they're not included.
Circles are different. Only you can see the names of your circles. You can put all your friends into a "friends" circle. Your geeky friends into a "geek" circle. Your mom and dad in their own circle. Your boss in his own circle....
That might sound hard, time consuming, whatever, but it's just drag and drop.
Boom.
Then when you want to post pictures from that party last night, you share with your friends circle, but leave your boss out of it. If you are selling a graphics card, you can post it to your geeky friends and leave your normal friends out of it. If you want to tell all your close friends you're NOT pregnant after all, just share with the besties, and no one else will know.
Win.
...have I convinced you it's cool yet?
There's also these things called "Sparks" that I'm still trying to figure out exactly... but here's a video:
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