Google Plus Reveals Up Google Games

Image courtesy Engadget

While Google may reign supreme in the web search category, Facebook and Twitter have shown the company's vulnerability in the world of social networking. While Google is hoping to make new inroads with the advent of Google Plus (no, I'm not going to type Google+), it looks like their new service is set to include games as well.

Google Takeout: Google+ Backup Tool

Google wants to differentiate from Facebook by offering a lot of ways to export your data. Google Takeout is a feature that's included in Google+, but it's also available as a standalone service. You can use it to export your contacts, Google Buzz messages, Picasa Web photos and Profile data with one click.

"Google Takeout lets you take your data out of multiple Google products in one fell swoop. Moreover, you’ll find that all your data is in portable and open formats‚ so it's easy to import to other services quickly," mentions the Data Liberation blog.

Google+ Users will have More Free Storage in Picasa Web

Picasa Web Albums offers more free storage if you are a Google+ user. According toPicasa Web's help center, "photos up to 2048 x 2048 pixels and videos up to 15 minutes won't count towards your free storage". If you upload photos from Google+, they're automatically resized to 2048 pixels on their longest edge, so they don't use the 1 GB of free storage that's available in Picasa Web Albums.

Compare Google+ and Facebook

The key features of the two social networks compare.

Google+

Profile

The checklist includes space to include a profile picture, general interests, a list of your pals, information about your education and work life and a ‘posts’ section, the equivalent of Facebook’s ‘wall’. So far, so familiar. But on Google+ you can list your ‘bragging rights’ (‘swimming champ’ for instance), write an introduction to yourself and air your nickname.

Liking

Google’s version of the Facebook ‘like’ button is the ‘+1’ feature, which has exactly the same function. Clicking it indicates to your network what’s interested/amused/annoyed you.

Google Plus Review: The Positive Feedback

Google is used to getting criticism. No question about that. There has so far been plenty about the company’s latest attempt at social media: Google+. Of course it’s not even fully launched yet.

There is also some good feedback about it. A lot of those fortunate enough to get invites actually do like it. You’ve probably seen some of the articles by now.

Google Plus Invites Appearing on eBay

How much would you pay for a Google Plus invite?

Google+ Android App

One of the most impressive parts of Google's beta rollout of Plus social Network is the fact that Google had a fully functional Android application available in the Android Market the minute Plus went live.

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Which Android App Wins: Google Plus, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn?

Google+ Invite: If You Got One Consider Yourself Lucky

Tutorials on how to use Google Plus

Waiting for a Google Plus invite? Google is rolling out the service in waves and you can expect it to become a ubiquitous social option in the coming months. We have been playing with the service since getting invites yesterday and there are a lot of things to like about Google's new social initiative.

Unlike Google's last big invite-only rollout of a social initiative - Google Wave - users will not be confounded on just what the heck you are supposed to with the service when signing up for the first time. From Friendster, Friendfeed, MySpace and Facebook, users are familiar with how a social platform is theoretically supposed to look. At its core level, Plus is not that much different. Yet, there is so much more. How do you get started with Google Plus? Let's break down the nuts and bolts.

Create Your Circles

Imagine the ability to break down Facebook into its various constituent parts and keep them separate from each other as opposed to one giant feed. That is what Google has done with Plus. There is one main stream where all your friends updates show up then the option to see updates from only certain groups like "Work," "Friends" or "Family." This is the essence of Circles.

From the initial interface, you will see four buttons - Home, Photos, Profile and Circles.

Google Shuts Down Google+ Invites

Because Of "Insane Demand" Search Engine giant Shuts Down Google+ invites.Google's social network is off to a somewhat successful launch. The early looks at the site have been generally positive, and demand to join appears to be strong.

Vic Gundotra, VP of Social at Google, posted on Plus, "We've shut down invite mechanism for the night. Insane demand. We need to do this carefully, and in a controlled way. Thank you all for your interest!"

Of course, this a controlled rollout, so who knows how many people are joining. And who knows if it will catch on with a larger audience. Right now it reminds us of Quora. Lots of hip tech folks talking to each other, but lacking in the normals.

Google+ Latest Screenshoots

Features of Google+:

Google+’s features. Some first impressions:

Design: Aesthetically, it’s all Google — minimalist with plenty of white space. Nobody is going to complain about the design, but nobody is going to cheer about it, either.

Usability: Google+ isn’t overwhelmed by its many features. It’s easy to navigate and its icons speak for themselves. After a few minutes of exploring, I quickly got the hang of it.
Google+ Stream: The core of Google+ is the Stream, which doesn’t bring anything new to the table. It’s a lot like Google Buzz or the Facebook News Feed.

A Closer Look at Google’s Facebook Competitor

The Google+ Project

Google revealed some details about the project that will make Google more social. It's called Google+ and it's an extension of the existing Google Profiles, with many new features that make sharing more useful. Google's plan to compete with Facebook is to bring "the subtlety and substance of real-world interactions" to the Web.

Google+ means "Google + You", so it's all about your friends, your photos and videos, your interests and your conversations. The service introduces circles, a way to group your friends and share content with the right people. "Today's online services turn friendship into fast food—wrapping everyone in 'friend' paper — and sharing really suffers. From close family to foodies, we found that people already use real-life circles to express themselves, and to share with precisely the right folks. So we did the only thing that made sense: we brought Circles to software. Just make a circle, add your people, and share what's new."