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Are you thinking about joining Google+?

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On Wednesday, Web-traffic watcher comScore Inc. estimated Google+ has had 20 million unique visitors since its launch, including five million visitors from the U.S. The growth of Google+ has impressed observers because access to it is by invitation only, meaning people can join only if a current member invites them. Eventually, Google plans to incorporate features of Google+ in its other services, such as its YouTube video site. Are you looking out for an invite to join Google+?

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    • 7 days ago
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    I've already joined Google + - 20 million is a tremendous result for invitation only. I'm not using it to post yet and will probably hang fire and see who else uses it first; my main interest is in using it to follow brands as I do with Twitter and those pages haven't been launched yet.

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    • 7 days ago
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    how about "already there"?

    also, for anyone misreading: it's 20 million *visits* not users.

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    • 7 days ago
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    I too am already on G+, and I have made the swap from facebook; I no longer post on facebook, only check it to keep up with the increasingly small number of friends on there who are not now posting on G+

    I love the fact that farmville is not on there. I despise that game, so hopefully google games will be in a separate tab on the page.

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    • 6 days ago

    I *did* think about it. And then decided not to, for the same reasons I haven't joined Facebook:

    a) There's no point to it. If I want to share an idea, a link, a photo, etc, with others, then I'll e-mail it or share it in person.

    b) These "social networking" sites are major invasions of privacy, creating a dossier on you and your "friends." And it's based not only on your Facebook activities, but on everywhere else you go on the internet that Facebook (and now Google+) has a link while you're logged in.

    c) It's too much of a temptation to waste a whole lot of time, with virtually nothing productive coming from it.

    An exception is to use it for business/professional purposes, when you want to communicate & share relevant information with the public.

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      • 6 days ago
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      That's an interesting point-of-view. I'm on Google+ but I'm also on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

      The remarkable thing about social media is that people I've lost track of are back in communication with me. I'm astounded at the number of contacts I've made over the years. I had no idea it was that many.

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        • 6 days ago

        But how does that differ from other methods of contact? E.g., I resumed contact with a woman I knew and dated in high school, about 20 years later, but that was just via mutual contacts and e-mail addresses being passed around (i.e., another form of social media, but it's one that no company monitors, scans, or collects data on).

        One other problem I see with "social media": it becomes more difficult to *not* maintain contact with someone. E.g., if you "friend" someone, then how do you un-Friend them, without it coming across as similar to a divorce? They had full access to your pictures, discussions, what you do and what you like, etc, and then you're completely locking and blocking them out? And so, it becomes difficult to un-friend someone, even if he wasn't much of a friend to begin with, and you conclude you'd rather he not be an ongoing participant in your Facebook/Google+ circle of "friends".

        Something I recall from a WSJ article: Facebook accounts end up being like "branding": it's a highly censored and polished presentation of yourself, designed to make yourself look good. So, that too leads me back to the idea it being mostly useful for professional purposes, not personal.

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    • 6 days ago
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    I'm on Google+. I wonder why the poll doesn't offer that option.

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    • 6 days ago
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    Don Hansen wrote: "But how does that differ from other methods of contact? E.g., I resumed contact with a woman I knew and dated in high school, about 20 years later, but that was just via mutual contacts and e-mail addresses being passed around (i.e., another form of social media, but it's one that no company monitors, scans, or collects data on)."

    The difference is speed and quantity. I signed up for FB and my page lay fallow for a year when someone asked me to organize a high school reunion. I moved 800 miles away decades ago and lost track of almost everyone. I rounded up over 100 former classmates in the first 48 hours alone. How? I uploaded my sizable contact list to FB and it figured out who I was likely to know automatically and suggested "friends". Maybe I could have done it the old-fashioned way but it would have taken a lot more time and effort.

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      • 6 days ago

      But that supports my idea of using Facebook/Google+ for professional purposes. In your instance, you just as easily could have set up a Facebook account specifically for organizing the reunion. True, it required that everyone *else* have a personal Facebook account (so that you could find *them*) but it wasn't necessary for you to have a personal account set up.

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        • 5 days ago
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        Well, you're certainly welcome to use FB for professional purposes. As for me, that's how I DON'T use it. I prefer it for personal pursuits, like that reunion I mentioned. My FB profile does not even say what I do or where I work. I use LinkedIn for that.

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    • 2 days ago
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    20 mn already joined, you also can join: http://www.ciol.com/News/News/News-Reports/Google-set-to-cross-20-mn-users-this-weekend/152285/0/

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    • 15 hours ago

    Yup, just waiting for an invite :)

    Facebook is a necessary evil; a very convenient but crassly commercial and invasive tool to stay connected with old friends and classmates. Google is a highly competent collection of email, docs, and research tools. I'm looking forward to dumping Facebook and adding Plus to my bag of Google utilities that I use every day. Long Google.

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