Comment by badclient | Hacker News Reader

Comment by badclient | Hacker News Reader

Google+ as a competitor to facebook is dead.

Now, you can come up with all the creative ideas in the world about how G+ is not supposed to be a facebook killer. I believe that is a cop out.

Google really wants to kill facebook and hoped to make a dent with G+. Why is it hard to acknowledge that they haven't made any noticeable dent? And that for the most part, facebook was very quick to address the granular privacy features that made G+ somewhat interesting.

You can already see how Google+ is being integrated into the company’s entire product line. The +1 button is visible on every YouTube video and search results page, and it is even on single images from the site’s visual search. Earlier this week, Google began offering Google+ pages for businesses, too.

Very classic error: assuming development/integration equal traction. Yes, google can slap +1 button on every darn page. And of course a bunch of people might click on it. The billion dollar question is what longterm benefit does G+ deliver to its users? Is there any? Engagement metrics usually answer this question. But Google won't release engagement metrics. Guess away as to why...

I respectfully disagree. Was your expectation that G+'s user-base would eclipse FB after 5 months? I don't think that's realistic (really going out on a limb here). By that metric you could have said the same thing about FB in the early days when MySpace had all the users. Clearly, over time, people moved to the better product.

If you want to comment on the rate of adoption, that's one thing, but lets compare apples to apples.

I don't care about the user-base numbers. All I care about is engagement. Facebook had crazy engagement even when they had 1000 members. When they had 10M, over 50% of the users were logging in daily. Google now has 40M users and yet they refuse to release engagement numbers.

Facebook had great engagement early on because all the early users were in the same social circles. Wouldn't surprise me at all that 1000 users at the same college as me would result in more usage as opposed to 40 million users scattered across the world.

I chalk that up as a deadly blunder on Google's part.

No one forced google to just open up G+ to the entire world. I feel they botched the launch of G+ by allowing scattered masses to join instead of totally nailing smaller groups like how Facebook did.

I think they nailed a single group, the already fairly well connected tech and startups people. This also dragged along those interested in these people although they get less value from it as it's more of a Twitter like following medium unless lots of people are putting you in their circles.

Google certainly have the resources to nail more smaller groups, it's just not the way they operate as this doesn't scale well.

I disagree that they have nailed any group. For me, nailing a group would mean that group ditching their competitor. Yet, I can't name a single Valley friend of hundreds who has ditched facebook for Google+. Now, I can name you dozens who have a G+ account and have tinkered with it. But that is hardly "nailing" it.

I think you actually nailed it: google doesn't know how to scale social because social doesn't scale the same way as most other products. Facebook scaled growth in a very methodical manner from university to university and later country to country.

Actually, Google+ is doing fairly well among bloggers, especially tech bloggers. Some references: [1] [2].

Also, success of a product does not mean ditching competitors (although one of the report does even suggest that!), it means gaining sufficient acceptance initially, so that later it becomes a valid option to ditch competitors.

For example: I was an Orkut user (was not happy with it) for quite a long time (1 year or so), even after joining facebook. Not because Facebook was not good or successful but because there was already some engagement at Orkut that cannot be replaced in a jiffy.

[1] http://www.blogworld.com/2011/07/13/prominent-tech-bloggers-...

[2] https://plus.google.com/113117251731252114390/posts/3wfvDJEi...

Actually, Google+ is doing fairly well among bloggers, especially tech bloggers. Some references: [1] [2].

Sorry, tech bloggers is a vastly different segment than tech users. Neither are optimal groups to target if you want to build a mainstream social network.

"All I care about is engagement"

I am not following. So if a site has 10 or 1000 users who are all engaged (maybe a community soccer forum or something), it's a success, but if it has 40M+ with an engagement that is unknown, it's dead? I am not convinced.

IMO, you can't simply disregard user-base and growth speed. Those numbers matter.

This discussion is specifically about facebook vs. G+; not a random site with 1,000 users.

We know that both sites have achieved significant user-base. We also know that one of those sites has crazy engagement and that it's had crazy engagement for a long time. That site is facebook. We know that the other site has 40+M members but publishes no engagement metrics and when pushed, avoids questions about engagement. It is not a stretch to assume from this that their engagement is not optimal. It is safe to say that facebook wins the engagement war.

The common counterargument is "but G+ only launched few months ago." To this, I counter that few months into facebook's launch, their engagement was very high.

The next common argument is that "but G+ got 40M+ members in few months." To this I say that the 40+M number says very little about G+ and says much about the Google search engine. As an example, I'd argue Google can launch a fictitious service and get tens of millions of signups for it by linking to it from google.com.

Here's a guess: engagement metrics of a 4.5 month old site are pretty pointless. And since Google+ is clearly not in the Facebook ballpark of usage, it would only reflect badly on Google. So why should Google release them? If you think not reaching Facebook-like status or denting Facebook in 4.5 months means Google+ is dead as a Facebook competitor, what could have Google done in that amount of time that would have made them a competitor in your eyes?

facebook always had crazy engagement. From the time they had 1000 users to millions of users.

And how long after launch did Facebook release their engagement metrics?

Yeah, that's what I thought.

Uhu, way before they had 40M users: "10 million users and over 50% of them sign in daily."

http://theubiquitouslibrarian.typepad.com/the_ubiquitous_lib...

But there's another factor at play here. Many of Facebook's early users didn't have anything else to engage with -- facebook filled a hole. That's not the case with G+: most users already have facebook so they're trying to

So like Kylekramer mentioned: G+ engagement might be lower (and that's why they're not releasing figures) but engagement for an early stage social network competing against a dominant product is not a good metric of long term product quality. Users will choose the better product, over time.

but engagement for an early stage social network competing against a dominant product is not a good metric of long term product quality

Absolutely disagree. I think user growth metrics is a bad metric for a new product but engagement is the perfect metric when gauging product quality.

A large media campaign can pump up registrations--just like linking to G+ from the google.com homepage did. But it won't pump up engagement.

In contrast, organic growth like facebook's early days means smaller user-base but if the product is good, more engagement than the competitor. And let's not forget, in 2006 no one in the Valley or media was talking much about facebook. It was all about celebrating MySpace.

While I think that's true, my point is that product quality in the long run isn't best represented by engagement now because Facebook is already soaking up all the engagement. Engagement is not going to grow quickly when you have two very similar products, one which has almost complete dominance, and a new one.

And, yes, in 2006 Facebook was the underdog compared to Myspace but had high engagement levels, but at that point not everyone had a Myspace. There was plenty of people who have never used a social network before. Whereas today, everyone has a Facebook.

So engagement shift from Facebook to G+ (if it happens eventually) will be very slow at first, but I think that in the long run, people will choose the better product.

That is like saying google.com when it launched should have had low engagement because there was also yahoo.com as the dominant player. It makes no sense. Google.com had crazy engagement because the product rocked. It did have a gradual growth because it took a while for people to hear about it but when they did try it, they got glued. Same with facebook.

I simply don't see many people getting glued to google+. Now you can argue that it's because not a lot of people are on it to which I counter that 40+M people are on it; way more than enough for a good product to score engagement.

You can also argue that 40+M members are too isolated groups, to which I say who's fault is that? A big part of doing social is having a growth and engagement strategy. The only strategy google seemed to have is to slap a G+ signup button on their homepage. All that has done is deliver false signs of success.

Users will choose the product all their friends use over time. That's the nature of this market. At this stage, almost any growth for G+ is impressive.

Seems like another classic error is arguing from insufficient evidence. In 2006 you probably would have argued that "Facebook as a competitor to Myspace is dead." too, no?

For that matter, Myspace failed to kill facebook too. But they're still around and reasonably successful.

Why does it matter so much who kills who? If you don't like G+, don't use it. If your friends are there, join in. If you don't like their policies about privacy or whatnot, then make that case.

Quite the opposite =) I have links to my comments on venturebeat in 2006 saying how MySpace is going to die and facebook is the big thing that no one in the Valley seems to know about.

So then I don't follow: why is arguing that G+ is dead based on usage metrics now OK, but doing it 5 years ago for facebook was wrong?

The actual facebook engagement even 5 years ago was insane: "10 million users and over 50% of them sign in daily." http://theubiquitouslibrarian.typepad.com/the_ubiquitous_lib

It wasn't that people were attacking facebook's engagement 5 years ago; it was that very few people in the Valley even knew about facebook because they were lost in the myspace hype and couldn't join facebook due to the .edu requirement.

>Google+ as a competitor to facebook is dead.

That's ridiculous. You're talking about the company that has Chrome, Gmail, Android, and Google.com. Any one of those could potentially spark Google+ in time. And it's not like Facebook is infallible.

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