• macrocephalic@lemmy.fmhy.ml
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    1 year ago

    I don’t really get what the hate was for Google+, it was better than the alternative/competitor at the time (Facebook)

    • TheyKeepOnRising@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Google+ forced itself on people. I didn’t want it so I stopped using my Gmail entirely. I imagine word of mouth caused people to avoid it.

      • Stovetop@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        And the ridiculous part on top of that is that it was the exact opposite situation at first. When it first launched, you had to be a friend of a friend of a Google employee to register or you weren’t getting in. It took me a about a month before a friend of mine studying CompSci at university with the kid of some Google employee was able to pass an invitation my way.

        I get the purpose was to generate hype by making it seem “exclusive” like Facebook was in the early days, but it took way too long before the people who genuinely wanted to use it were allowed to openly register for it. It was like that for 3 months, and a lot of people who gave up on trying to get an invite lost interest after the initial buzz died down.

        And then Google wasn’t satisfied with upsetting the people that wanted to use it, so they had to go and upset the people who didn’t want to use it by later forcing it on everyone with a Google account.

        • snor10@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          It’s kind of funny, isn’t this exactly what Meta is doing to everyone with an Instagram account? You have a shadow profile on Threads regardless if you signed up or not.

          I wonder why the reaction is so different, maybe because they both are social media? Or maybe just good timing with the whole Twitter debaucle.

          • Stovetop@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            I think there is still concern. When Threads launched, the media was full of articles outlining commonly-stated concerns about privacy and the involuntary connection between Instagram and Threads.

            The problem is that zoomers who are flocking to it in droves don’t seem to care about any of that. And I don’t think it’s due to ignorance, but probably more like generational defeatism.

            • snor10@lemm.ee
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              1 year ago

              Yes, there has for shure been a shift in the culture. Privacy doesn’t seem to be that big of a concern for most.

              I’m not so sure it’s just the zoomers that are to blame, plenty of older people don’t seem to care either. But I do feel for the younger generation, having never known the freedom and joys of the pre-corporate internet. Then again, maybe ignorance is bliss after all.

      • yourgodlucifer@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        Yea I was annoyed that they were making me sign up for google+ for my youtube account so I never tried it I just set it up so I could keep using youtube.

    • assassinatedbyCIA@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Google wasn’t comfortable in letting it grow naturally over time. They tried really hard to push on people by combining it with other more popular google products when it didn’t really make sense (i.e. Youtube). Also, as a teen at the time google plus just felt nerdy and weird. It didn’t really feel like something they cool kids would use so no one used it.

      • R51@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Yeah that’s how I felt too. I remember being excited about g+, then I also remember aggressively turning off any association to g+ because no one was on it and it kept pushing it in my face. Come to think of it gmail was similar, invite only and that, but it wasn’t forced even at release and they made it look a lot nicer than what yahoo and hotmail had going on at the time.

      • knightry@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        For a while, Google bonuses were tied to social integration. That’s why you saw the huge influx of insanity.

    • debounced@kbin.run
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      1 year ago

      and from what i remember, staying true to typical google fashion, they fucked it up by not opening up the “beta” when they had a critical mass forming behind it. then only to force everyone into having a profile a year or whatever later. lol, too late. i think most of us understood that anything associated with google is assumed to be a never-ending “beta”, so no idea what they were thinking or waiting for.

      • MetalFingers@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I think it was definitely the super long beta period where you needed an invite killed it. I knew a ton of people who were interested that gave up

        • kadu@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          That’s easy to say now, but Orkut (another Google social network, mostly used in Brazil) also had a beta invite system… And that helped it grow tremendously. The secrecy and “status” of getting invited made people go wild - they would even sell invites.

          The strategy can work. It’s just very timing sensitive.

          • adude007@lemmy.ml
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            1 year ago

            Orkut was young when Facebook access was still restricted to college kids only. Google+ was dumb. You’d get and then it was just tumble weeds.

          • MrShankles@reddthat.com
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            1 year ago

            I’m not sure if I’m mis-remembering, but I believe my first Gmail account was by invitation. It was pretty much just an email account back then

            • meteotsunami@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Correct, I got my account invite from The Screensavers show with Kevin Rose. They were giving them out randomly to viewers.

    • crunchpaste@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 year ago

      It was definitely much better than Facebook at the time. Especially the concept of circles that they implemented.

    • Zorque@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      Poorly supported, forced integration with other google services, facebook was good enough TM for most.

    • cyrusg@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      It was good but it didn’t really add enough or solve an actual problem. At the time, there wasn’t as much negative sentiment around Facebook. The circles were a neat concept but too much work to use for the average user.

      • Erk@cdda.social
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        1 year ago

        It’s strange to note that if Google had just casually worked on the feature, started gradually integrating it with YouTube etc, they might have beat insta to the punch and also really capitalized on Facebook hate. Instead they made one massive marketing blunder after another.

    • talung@lemmy.talung.org
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      1 year ago

      I agree, and the level of user on G+ was of a techy IT variety of person. It was great and you could have good conversations. Lemmy really has that feel now. Enjoy it till either the general public gets hold of it and it turns into a cesspool or it slowly dies a death.

      Personally I hope to face neither of those scenarios, but history is not on our side.

    • ConditionOverload@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I liked it a lot, honestly. Was a very cool community and Google’s app for it was awesome. The web interface was great too.

    • twistedtxb@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      The concept of who you chose to share your status was cumbersome. It at least not auntie or uncle friendly

      I don’t remember what it was called? Spaces?

      • mosiacmango@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        I don’t remember what it was called? Spaces?

        Circles. It was a killer feature at the time, the idea of different feeds for different groups, all in one profile. Too bad there weren’t enough groups to make it useful.

        • Trainguyrom@reddthat.com
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          1 year ago

          Being able to share certain posts with everyone (including your parents/grandparents) vs just your friends vs your work colleagues was a brilliant feature that seems to have just been substituted with private group chats instead. Seriously when I was a teenager the amount of stuff I thought about posting but didn’t because it would appear for everyone…

    • Lucidlethargy@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      I still miss Google plus so much… It had the most intelligent groups of people I’ve ever experienced on social media both then, and now.