Google+: New marketing sensation??

A couple of weeks back Google launched its new social networking service Google+. And within this short period of time, it has already become a sensation, especially among techies. People are endlessly talking and sharing their views on this topic.

This made me to go into some details of this new buzz word.

The Google + starts with Circles. It’s a bit confusing term, but a Circle is the list of people an individual wants to share information with. This information can be anything like sharing locations, status, photos, videos and many more. You can make multiple circles like this and name it. The cool thing is that none of your friends who are added to circles will know which circle they are a part of.

Google + has an “asymmetric sharing model”. This means you can share one way with the people but it’s not mandatory for them to share with you. If you both share, then it shows in your stream. There are three modes in which you can share the information. Public, Extended and Limited. Public is public on your profile and in the stream of everyone who circles you. Extended includes friends of people in your circles. Limited is people selected from certain circles. Twitter is an example of this model. Facebook is an example of symmetric sharing model, where two people mutually confirm them as friends and then only can share the stuff.

There is a main difference between Groups and Circles. In groups, everybody knows who is in the group. For circles it’s exactly opposite.

Advantages of Google+ includes it puts privacy first, manages sharing with selective lists, you can version your profile by circles. Disadvantages include it’s a bit confusing, problems can arise when circles collide and there is little social discovery.

It will be too early to discuss about success or failure of this new service, but for sure, it has taken the web by storm and people are talking something other than Apple.