Why yo momma won’t use Google+ (and why that thrills me to no end)

I read an interview with a record executive a long time ago and he answered the question, "How do you find the next big thing?"<p>"That's pretty easy," he said, "I just look for something that parents will hate."<p>That this is a successful strategy is self-evident. (American) kids want to differentiate themselves from their parents and will pay money to do so. They'll probably latch on in some form to anything as long as it fits the criteria that their parents don't like it.<p>I think it's a safe bet that the social networking site that replaces Facebook will have fewer features, be ugly, be more difficult to use, and have no redeeming qualities other than nobody's parents are going to participate in it, and kids will identify with it as the cool thing for that reason.

Wherever pics of their grandkids are, my momma will be.

I've always thought that social networks like Friendster, MySpace and Facebook follow a clear and old path laid out by the fashion industry.<p>Fashionable things are almost by definition meant not to last.<p>The early adopters will often take up something, be it Facebook, or new clothes, or a new band, largely because it is <i>not</i> (yet) popular. Or because it <i>is</i> exclusive.<p>Remember when Facebook was for just for ivy leaguers?<p>I remember when years ago Joel (of Joel on software) wanted a Facebook that really is strictly restricted to college students. Remember that?<p>The late adopters will often follow the early adopters for no other reason then because the new thing is cool.<p>And this pattern guarantees there's always something new and nothing is cool for too long.<p>Now there's been a lot of talk about lock-in, social graphs, walled gardens, etc.. all reason why no one can do to Facebook what Facebook did to MySpace.<p>But.... I have my doubts. Google+ vs Facebook, I'm going to get some popcorn and enjoy watching this.

This is the most braindead review of the service that I have read. Any social network goes through the ghost town - early adopters - your mom stage, When your mom arrives, you can't say "fuck" anymore, and so you feel the need to move to another service. Add to this the copious amounts of wall-spam generated in Facebook and a lot of people are excited about Plus. Particularly because Circles is central to the service, even when your mom finally arrives, you'll still theoretically be able to let your mouth off. That's why this thing might have legs. Not because some nebulous and self-congratulatory definition of "geek" would theoretically like it.

I don't believe he has the required evidence to make this claim.<p>(1) I have a lot of non-techie friends that are interested in using this just to try it out -- they are early adopters but consumers instead of creators; they do not have technical ability.<p>(2) Whether or not Plus gains market traction is dependent on how it fits into the current social application space. 'Hangouts' and 'Circles' will help differentiate them but to gain a foothold the network effect is of greater importance. Google are making a very calculated move by inviting people with higher quality social graphs as this will help them here!<p>Plus' success will depend on:<p>(a) whether they can keep non-techie early-adopters interested in the new features they are providing.<p>(b) how well they manage to cross-pollinate between each of the services in their eco-system: the changes in Gmail, the navigation bar, and UI across their services point towards them realising this.<p>(c) easing the move in-between other social applications by providing APIs that could be accessed by more generic desktop and mobile applications that users often use to interact with networks: Tweetdeck, etc... As I said, it's all about harnessing network effects and getting the right people on the service. At this point, I don't see any reason to doubt they have momentum and if they're smart they will continue to connect their eco-system together in a way that creates long-term growth long after the buzz dies.<p>(3) It's quite presumptuous to assume that since many early-adopters are techies that this is how it will remain: does anybody remember when Twitter was only used by techies?<p>Let's just see how it plays out and avoid creating mindless tech gossip...?

My Mom is already on it. The first thing I thought when I saw hangouts is "My Mom will be on this a lot chatting with relatives." She wanted the group video chat on Skype but it only works if everyone else pays for it. No barrier with Google+

It is a pretty big jump to say that since Google+ is geeky, therefore the masses won't adopt it. We are talking about an online social networking site. No matter how slick and friendly it looks, the early days of any website are bound to be geeky. Sure, Facebook was never really that geeky (you know, as ungeeky as a Harvard social network can be), but Twitter sure as hell was. That is the lifecycle of these sites. More importantly, yo momma may not have much of a choice. Google is making it pretty clear with all of the redesigns that the Google+ tail will be wagging the Google services dog. Once yo momma starts googling her friends and seeing their profile pop up in search results, looks up directions and see recommendations in the area from her friends, and so on, I'll bet she'll start using it.<p>Now whether that is good or bad is another question, but Google does seem to have it set up so your mom being on there won't hold you back much.

I think he's trying to make his wife what she isn't: an early adopter. The mainstream wants something that their other <i>mainstream</i> (not early adopter) friends are also using. The early adopters are revolutionaries. The mainstream likes status quo. But that's true about every single technology. Facebook has gone through this, too. Twitter, as well. Would your mom or wife use Twitter in the first year after Twitter launched? But I think Google+ transition to mainstream will be pretty smooth, because it's a great and easy to use product, and it's just a matter of having enough early critical mass to get everyone to hear about it.<p><a href="http://www.quickmba.com/marketing/product/diffusion/" rel="nofollow">http://www.quickmba.com/marketing/product/diffusion/</a>

I wonder if the whole restricted invites thing is part of a marketing strategy aimed at Facebook:<p>- Preview ahead of next week to steal FB's thunder about their "big announcement"<p>- Invites quickly pulled<p>- Everybody who doesn't have a G+ invite begging around for one, they're even up for sale on eBay - everyone's just waiting to get onto G+<p>- On same day as the FB announcement, G+ goes public, everyone invited<p>- Zuck makes his "big announcement" (I dunno, maybe video chat or something) and everyone shrugs.

Nobody in my family uses Facebook. We all have the same sort of privacy concerns. For us, there is no switching cost. At the same time, all of us use gmail. From what I've seen, Google+ looks like it has better privacy features built in (although it's privacy from the public, not private to teh Google). So, I hope my momma will use Google+ because it make sharing things with family a lot easier.

g+ is going to be like a "grown up" facebook - without the farmville games and the like. It'll be the social network for people who've avoided facebook over perceived privacy slights. It'll be somewhat like a cross between facebook and a friendlier linkedin.<p>It'll be a lot of things to a lot of people, but it won't be a 'facebook killer' any time soon. G+ is going to be expanding the social network user pie for a while, rather than siphoning off large chunks from facebook.

Why not? Give it time and soon enough, everybody will be in Google+. The video conferencing is a huge attraction. If you want a social network non-geeky types will not go, you go to rstatus.com or identi.ca where they don't have features for mass consumption.

The article isn't bad, and I more or less agree with a lot of it, but I feel like this individual is dramatically underestimating normal people vs. Silicon Valley folk.<p>Namely: Being a geek doesn't mean you don't have a developed social graph. I've got several friends who don't really mess around with the techy side of anything, who range from 400-1000 friends. Mostly, they're women, but there are one or two men there.<p>Basically, good article, but presumptuous attitude.

- To bold text you surround that text with asterisks. <i>Like this</i> GEEKY ALERT!<p>If non-geeks are using @ to mention people on Twitter, they'll also use * to make text bold.

&#62; Oh, and that’s not even considering the new "Hangout" videochat feature<p>I've just realized that lots of "normal" FB users browse it from work, where chances are close to 0 that they'd use any videochat service whatsoever (you don't want your boss overhearing your discussion with your best friend about how stupid Rihanna is or about how Mark fucked up his entire life because he married Sue, just to give a few examples). So, yeah, Hangout is cool to power/media-guru users, like Scoble is, but I fail to see how Google is supposed to make a shitload of money on the back of them only.

Just wait until Lady Gaga joins Google+. You'll see millions of her fans alone joining Google+. I think she'll do it soon if she's not on it already. I know she likes tech stuff and she's also a fan of Google.

It is best to first ship a product to early adopters and keep a healthy feedback loop as you expand to more people. I am not saying that it will succeed, but they have a good rollout strategy.

I bet the big announcement FB makes in upcoming press conference is<p>"We are announcing these fantastic new features to Facebook users: &#60;copy-paste G+ features here&#62;"

Honestly, while the UI looks nice, I don't see any major advanage in switching.<p>Facebook: Proprietary network without federation<p>Google Plus: Proprietary network without federation<p>So great, I can now jump from one locked-in network into another locked-in network.<p>Personally I think that Google Plus was the worst thing that can happen to networking in general, as it pretty much killed the chance of an open XMPP-based alternative.

<i>To bold text you surround that text with asterisks. </i>Like this* GEEKY ALERT! Italicize? Put underscores around the text. Strikeout? Put hyphens around it.*<p>Really? The most trivial markdown syntax is for the Geeks only? I don't want to live in that world; that sounds like a nightmare of truly incompetent users.

This geek elitism is tiring, and I find myself unwilling to filter it out so I can evaluate the actual message.

I must say I disagree with this post. Based on how my "normal" friends use facebook, I'm impressed to the lengths they can go just because they love the product, or because it's trendy. Many non-geeks today like to think of themselves as computer savvy, and I think little tricks like the bold and italics will seem cool for them and not "geeky" or "hard". But that's just a circle of hipster twentysomethings.<p>In the end, if your mom doesn't understand the internet, she'll go to what she hears is popular and not what's simple. And if the hipsters join the bandwagon many people will follow independently of wether they understand it or not (I find this to be especially true for twitter, where a lot of people I know joined because a lot of others were using it, but they never really understood the service).

I was hoping someone would offer up this argument and I'm glad it was Scoble. I think that Google is filling a void with plus because it's doing exactly what Scoble mentions, providing a social network for geeks. Sure, their intent is most likely to knock at Facebok, though, at the core, I'm sure the push behind the project was to develop something for people like them...or, us. Those who are deterrent should really put some time into this. I haven't gotten to use it yet and based on the reports, I know I'm going to love it. As opposed to creating a Facebook "killer," Google has drawn a dichotomy between SoCiAl and <i>social</i>. Smart. And keep in mind, this is just the first version.

"I’ve followed 2,723 people"<p>This kind of thing baffles me. How can anyone meaningfully follow that number of people? Surely all you're going to get from that many is a stream of mostly trivia that you're not really interested in.

&#62; Since most of the people who are on Google+ so far are geeks, insiders, social media stars, journalists, and other people<p>This is what I fear the most with +. I'm just as nerdy as the next guy, but I like to have some good un-clean fun with my friends, and Google+ comes off as conservative and parental. If Google stays too clean it won't draw the non-technical users I converse with on Facebook, and <i>enjoy</i> conversing with. Part of the fun of Facebook is the college atmosphere where few things are off-limits.

One thing that I haven't heard yet is that Google+ is the worst name they could ever come up with!<p>"+"? Are you kidding me?<p>On the other hand: here is a feature that would help G+ to take of: Tight integration with Android (2.1 and above at least!!! not 3.1) with android video hangout over wifi and 3G for free(!) international! A tough move, I know, but without something on this scale, this could just be another wave.

No matter how awesome Hangout is (and I thinks it's very cool), I can't use it yet with a lot of people I talk to. Skype is more ubiquitous and thus I can call "normal" people. If this guys prediction is true, and Google+ won't have widespread adoption outside of geeky communities, then it will fail. I need something like Skype that can bridge from geeks -&#62; non-geeks.

Agree with this assessment. G+ is geeky enough to dissuade the non-tech people so mom-and-pop users will probably not switch en-mass from Facebook.<p>The real question is, is this enough for Google to not kill it (like Wave)? Or are they in the Social scene domination business and a core geeky consumer base is not enough to sustain G+ and they move on to the next Social "thing"?

Another commercial with Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber will get them around 10M users, that's for sure ;)<p>I haven't personally tried out Google+ (I wish i could), but if Google holds it back long enough to create enough buzz about it and people already invited keep saying that it is awesome, i believe they will have enough adopters to grow strong.

Arg! I misread the title as "Why Yo-Yo Ma won't use Google+..." Interesting article anyway. I've heard more than one person say that people aren't going to switch from Facebook. As someone who doesn't use Facebook... I think I might actually use Google+ Then again I said that about Wave too.

How do you bold and italicize on Facebook? I'm not aware of the ability.<p>Personally I think having a Word interface for a textarea is pretty darn geeky. Using Markdown or some other markup language is better solution since those who don't know just won't use it.

So Google's facebook-beater is a product that appeals only to hardcore geeks and not "yo momma"? I doubt it. Maybe for now, but not for long.<p>Anyway, if it's that important to dodge your mother online, there's always Orkut.

google+ isn't a jump-ship kind of product. It's a creep into your life while you weren't looking and never let you go kind of product.<p>People will use it slowly at first and it will just snowball.

While I haven't used it yet - my biggest difficutly with the service seems to be that Circles actually act as "silos" and are mutually exclusive.<p>That is, you cannot add "Robert Scoble" to different circles such as "friends" and "Tech feed" - you must choose EITHER "friends" OR "tech feed".<p>This draws difficulties [and again I haven't used it so please someone clarify if I'm wrong] - if I have a friend who is both a work college and a friend ? Where do I place this user ? I'm assuming "lay tech" people will want the ability to overlap contacts ?<p>Edit: great thanks for clarifying! :)

hmmm, i don't know if scobleizer is a benefit to a product or the kiss of death ...<p>for me Google+ is missing key features, like a decent messaging system, and events ... it's also lacking a feature to link up with similar interest groups ... On first impression, i'm not really convinced

My mom already wants to join. :)

This means that it will end up having the size of twitter?

I wonder what Google learned from it's social network popular in India and South America, Orkut.