Bam!
There it is. Right on the front page of the world’s largest search engine. Largest, as in hundreds of millions of searches per day, that is. And every visitor is now seeing a big bold blue arrow pointing their way to Google+, which is now open to all comers.
And in case you didn’t notice the big blue arrow, there’s also a little note under the search box.
And it’s more than a social network
When Google announced the open beta program yesterday on their blog, they highlighted the fact that the Google+ initiative is still in its early stages. Specifically, they noted that 100 improvements had been introduced in the about 100 days since the product launched in a limited fashion. The message is clear: this is only the beginning.
What’s striking about the list of the latest changes on that blog post, I think, is the non-social aspect of some of the changes. Yes, they’re social, but they’re not Facebook social. Things like participating in video calls from your smartphone, sharing and collaborating on documents, and search have social aspects to them, but they’re really business applications. And that’s what makes the Google+ play more interesting right now.
People don’t need another social network. But they do need better ways to communicate, collaborate, and find the best stuff that people are sharing.
If you haven’t joined Google+ yet to see what all the fuss is about, now seems like a good time. If you want to catch up on some reading about the platform, you can check out my series of posts on Google+ right here.
Pingback: My best posts on Google Plus