Why You Shouldn't Write Off Google+ Just Yet

TheNextCorner writes "Cmdr Taco writes for The Washington Post on why you shouldn't write off Google+ just yet: "Google+ is technically better than its rivals in a number of key ways. The user interface is comfortable and friendly. It's easy to maintain circles of contacts, and to segregate what you share with each group. Discussions of small-to-medium sizes are manageable and readable — even in real time. Facebook wins when it comes to the open graph and app ecosystem, but a lot of people don't care about that stuff.""

Comments

Google What?

[s.petry]

I wrote off all social media long ago, I don't even keep track. No thanks, spy on someone else.

Re:Google What?

[i_ate_god]

but anonymity is bad too?

Re:Google What?

[jamesh]

I wrote off all social media long ago, I don't even keep track. No thanks, spy on someone else.

You're missing the point. Facebook is a tool that _you_ use to spy on and stalk _other_ people. As long as you don't post anything any more revealing that "omg wtf my dog just farted!!1!!!1" then you don't have a problem. It's not like anyone can spy on anything other than what you post there.

Re:Google What?

[bmo]

I wrote off all social media long ago, I don't even keep track. No thanks, spy on someone else.

It's really no different than Usenet. Except with Usenet you don't have any control at all over who sees your post. Ever. It's not Facebook's or Google's fault that you can't figure out the filtering. Treat "social networking" as Usenet or BBS networks, and you're golden. It's not that hard. But wait there's more. Facebook has features that you can use to control *what other people say about you* - you can have tags (mentions of you) in other people's posts set to require your approval. How neat is that? And you can actually control who sees your posts, down to eliminating even single individuals. Want to blab a phone number or picture to all your "friends" but one? You can do it.

But wait, you say, Facebook knows all about you! Well, dearie, I hate to break it to you, but when I was an admin lo those many years ago, I saw who downloaded the watersports binaries. And no, they weren't about swimming. Nothing shocks me any more.

No, really, I see posts like yours, and when I mentally transport myself back to the 90s, it looks like you're whining. If you haven't learned how to manage your privacy by now, you shouldn't even be posting to Slashdot, announcing your views to the world here.

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BMO

Re:Google What?

[bmo]

No, it's not bullshit.

Posting to Facebook even back when it was strictly an academics-only community still meant that whatever you posted was public to that community. And if you think it was cloistered and that nobody from the outside could get in and read your stuff, you were delusional.

Go ahead and rage that Facebook "changed its privacy policies." People who knew better didn't post photos of drunken bacchanalia, because they knew that doing so was stupid, even in a "closed" network. Only the people who threw caution to the wind were upset when Facebook opened up to the public.

Here's a clue: Don't post anything in public (even in a "cloistered setting") that you don't want your mom, or the cops, to see. Follow that rule and you'll have no problems whatsoever with privacy. Yes it's self censorship. It's also called common sense. I followed the rule even back in the 80s and 90s even on small systems. It has done me well.

When Dejanews showed up and everyone friggin' panicked, I didn't give a shit, because nobody could hold whatever I said against me anyway.

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BMO

Re:Google What?

[datavirtue]

They almost have to do this. Online communities are being poisoned to death. While I value anonymous posting, much of the web is becoming unusable. This could be solved with better (think: out-of-the-box) moderation, but the other alternative to cleaning up something as invective as YouTube is to require real names. I would be willing to pay a small amount in able to join a community and use a handle, with the chance of getting banned by a REAL moderator, to participate in a grown-up conversation.