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Facebook Says That Google+ Has No Users 360

Posted by CmdrTaco from the pew-pew-no-you-are-dumb dept.
dkd903 noticed another amusing shot in the battle between G+ and Facebook. CNN is running a story where Facebook's director of game partnership Sean Ryan basically says Google+ has no users. The article is mostly about casual gaming on social platforms, which I am really sick of individually blocking.
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Facebook Says That Google+ Has No Users More

Facebook Says That Google+ Has No Users

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  • Google+ (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Mig55 ( 2439940 )
    He is quite correct. I have a Facebook account and several of my friends who wanted to see it also do.. but it's empty. There's nothing happening there. This interesting article [techdelete.com] also says the same - there is nothing happening in Google+, while people just use Facebook like before. It also points out that the circles by design make Google+ less social "social network" by greatly limiting what people share and see.

    I don't see it changing anytime soon either. Google+ misses all those things that make social

    • Re:Google+ (Score:4, Insightful)

      by jaymz666 ( 34050 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:04PM (#37120652)

      Facebook's data mining is more insidious.

      As for circles, being able to direct messages at friends, family, the world, is enormously useful. The problem is it means you have to decide on every post who you want to share it with. However, that means you know who every post is going to.

    • Re:Google+ (Score:4, Interesting)

      by yelvington ( 8169 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:16PM (#37120844) Homepage

      There's nothing happening there.

      Then you're doing it wrong.

      Put some interesting people in your circles. It's not all geeks. There's a very active bunch of photographers sharing images, people talking about cooking, local conversations (the mobile app does geolocation-based searches), and group video chat (Hangouts).

      Plenty is happening when I log in, but then I have about 500 people in my circles, and more than twice that number have me in their circles. My circles are quite a bit more active (and informative) than my Facebook news feed, but less than my Twitter feed.

      There is room for multiple services. This isn't the Highlander.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Daetrin ( 576516 )
      Funny, i see plenty of activity in my Google+ page. I don't know what's wrong with you and your friends.

      Of course i don't post much to Google+ myself since they currently don't allow me to use a pseudonym (at least not without the threat of having "something happen" to my account) but that's probably not the issue with your friends if they're migrants from Facebook.

    • Re:Google+ (Score:4, Funny)

      by oakgrove ( 845019 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:19PM (#37120872)

      Besides, I'm not quite comfortable with Google's datamining.

      Oh look! It's another paid Facebook hypocrite shill. Didn't you guys' astroturfing campaign get exposed months ago? And you're still at it?

      • Funny enough, this is the only article on /. that the OP, Mig55, has commented on.

    • I use google+, follow Wil wheaten and Felicia day (started playing Kingdom Rush or something like that because of her google plus game- it's a Tower Defense game).

      I LOVE the ability to separate family and various friends.

      Facebook really crushed my life together too much.

      My use of Facebook is down about 50%.

      My use of Google+ is up about 25%.

      I use social networking about 25% less.

      I'm inviting folks to Google+ and I noticed some of my friends have stopped posting on Facebook entirely.

      It's not as rich and robus

      • I tried following Wil and then noticed that 3/4 of my feed was Wil Wheaton. That seemed like too much.

        maybe time to re-add him now that I have a few more people there.

    • I've noticed Facebook works nicely as some kind of a rss reader if you join the pages that interest you.

      Have you tried using Sparks in G+? It's a better RSS reader than following Pages any day in my book.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by godrik ( 1287354 )

      "Besides, I'm not quite comfortable with Google's datamining. They already have my searches, youtube views, analytics from everywhere of the internet.."

      Interesting. A friend of mine was saying:

      "I do not care about with Google's datamining on Google+. They already have my searches, youtube views, analytics from everywhere of the internet..."

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cHiphead ( 17854 )

      I don't see annoying Zynga app-of-the-week update posts all day on Google+ and I actually interact with others about 'real' things to talk about other than the usual Facebook one-liner update.

      You are shilling for Facebook, I hope you are getting paid. G+'s ability to follow others that actually have something interesting to say gives it a definitive leg up on Facebook for individual social interaction (of course, FB is still the king for Corporation social media, while G+ still gets its stuff together).

    • How is Google's data-mining any different than Facebook's?

    • I have a [Google+] account and several of my friends who wanted to see it also do.. but it's empty. There's nothing happening there.

      You say this like there are things "happening" on Facebook.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Hatta ( 162192 )

      My girlfriend uses facebook and google+. She's always showing me some neat thing some famous astronomy nerd has posted on google+, never anything from facebook. It seems like the Google+ early adopters are more likely to be smart and have interesting stuff to share than the facebook commoners. That helps compensate for the lack of users.

      • I must admit that I post most of my geek stuff on Google+ and most of my generic "hey look at this link!" stuff on facebook.

        9 times out of 10 I get better discussion off my google+ list, even though my google+ list is almost exclusively a subset of my facebook list.

        • That could just be because "geek stuff" generates better discussion than "hey look at this link."

          Try posting the same thing to both and see where the better discussions develop

          • Re:Google+ (Score:4, Informative)

            by Skarecrow77 ( 1714214 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @02:16PM (#37122098)

            I do.

            when I say "9 times out of 10 i get better discussion" I'm talking about topics that would warrant discussion.

            I think that a lot of my friends just "skim" facebook for interesting stuff, but dig in to google+ because there's less there, so you have more time to peruse each post.

            It's like the tabloids at the supermarket. you're standing in line there, maybe you see that lindsey lohan has done something stupid or one of the kardashians is pregnant or tom cruise has been proven to be a robot or something. maybe you'll even pick up one and look at it for a few seconds... but there's so much garbage there that you just skim it and ignore most of it.

            if instead of 15 tabloids you had, say, 2 newspapers, you'd probably spend a lot more time looking at a given article in the time available to you.

            Honestly, I've found that very few of my facebook friends have much to say really. everything is in 1 or 2 sentence bites at best. occasionally somebody's post may have a good comments section where you can have a lively debate, but not often. I'm guessing that facebook limits you to about 4 or 5 sentences in your inital post to discourage people from posting 30-page spam updates or something like that, but considering that they auto-shorten anything beyond about 3 lines anyway, what's the point? I very much enjoy that Google+ will let my inital post be whatever the hell I want it to be.

  • He's Right (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Gr33nJ3ll0 ( 1367543 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:04PM (#37120648)
    There are no companies (users in Facebook speak) actively mining your content on Google+.

  • That's attractive, actually. Or at least, would be, if google would let those of us with google apps accounts have profiles and access google+.

    • They added the games to Google+ a few days ago. So far, not too bad. Hopefully they don't go the route of Facebook.

      • They are actually doing a good job to keep the games out of the way for those not interested in them. They are on a separate tab, and if you don't click that, you are not bothered by anything games related.

        Having said that - if you click on a game (any game as far as I can tell) you get a dialog like this:

        Angry Birds is requesting permission to:
        View basic information about your account
        View a list of people from your circles, ordered based on your interactions with them across Google

        Why doe

        • From what I can see it just looks at a list of your friends, so that it can cross reference it with the list it has of people playing. It dosn't bug your friends, but when you clear a level, it shows you the high scores of people on your friends list. In the case of angry birds it also has certain levels that are unlocked by totaling the stars of you and all of your friends. The best part, not one of my friends has ever gotten a Timmy wants you on angry birds, message or anything like that.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Tukz ( 664339 )

          Now that you opened the subject of requesting permission, why haven't Google learned anything yet?
          They do the exact same thing with Android.

          Let me explain.

          Using your example:
          Angry Birds is requesting permission to:
          View basic information about your account
          View a list of people from your circles, ordered based on your interactions with them across Google

          The first one, sure, go ahead.
          It might need my name and such, for scores.

          The second one, not so much.
          As you said, why the hell does it need to know?

          Why can't

          • I unhappily suspect they have learned from it: people appear to be willing to put up with it.
          • Yep, exactly. Why the hell does Swype, for one, need to know who is calling me, from which number?
            It pisses me off that good programs are conditional on compromising your own privacy. If only society were more discerning with what they agree to, these things wouldn't be so rampant. It's there because we accept it.
          • Well for the second one, what exactly is the point of playing the game on a social network if it isn't limiting the high scores it shows you to the high scores of your friends. I mean lets face it if you wanted a global high score, then you would be playing on kongregate or something, if you wanted to compare your high score to your close friends, well then the game would have to know who your close friends are to do that wouldn't it?
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • There are social games on Facebook? The only ones I've seen just let you send a request to "friends" asking them to click a button for you, no actual social interaction at all.

  • Fix the large Google+ vs. Google Apps problem (the one where those of us using Google Apps cannot use Google+ - period) and a lot of your "lack of content" issues will be solved.

    For now, we Google Apps users are stuck on Facebook, etc.

    C'mon Google - you've got the developers, now get to work.

  • isn't G+ still invite-only beta? (Score:4, Informative)

    by waddgodd ( 34934 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:05PM (#37120672) Homepage Journal

    From the "thank you Captain Obvious" department, something that's in an invite-only beta practically has no users. Really? How did you ever get THAT idea?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tukz ( 664339 )

      Well, it IS Google.
      They are known for having their applications in Beta for a very long time.
      Gmail got out of beta just "recently".

      But yeah, this still a closed beta to my knowledge, so it's not really a surprise it's low on users.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by somaTh ( 1154199 )
      Yes, it is invite-only. But, it still has 25 million [cnet.com] users, which sounds like a lot of people. I guess they must all be pushers instead of users.

    • Re:isn't G+ still invite-only beta? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Dahamma ( 304068 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:57PM (#37121380)

      Actually, this invite-only beta already has over 25 million users. 5% of Facebook's user base in a month by invitation only isn't too shabby.

  • My name is: No C. Users and I'm a Google+

  • Oh Noes! (Score:3)

    by webheaded ( 997188 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:08PM (#37120722) Homepage
    The service that hasn't actually officially opened yet to the public has no users? I, for one, am shocked. Absolutely shocked. It's invite only, for crying out loud, shut up already. Let's just wait and see what happens when they actually release the damn thing. You can't say it's dead and you can't say it's going to kill Facebook because IT HAS NOT EVEN BEEN OPENED FOR PUBLIC REGISTRATION YET. Good lord, people. Let's all take a step back for a second, take a deep breathe, and give it a little time before you make your baseless predictions.

  • It's a feature (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Tridus ( 79566 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:11PM (#37120770) Homepage

    Isn't no Farmville spam the entire selling point of Google+? Everybody I know using it is there precisely because it's NOT Facebook and doesn't have all the annoying spam (and even more annoying emo users) that make Facebook a wasteland of human stupidity.

    • Come on, human stupidity on facebook can be funny sometimes.

      http://failbook.failblog.org/ [failblog.org]

    • I believe the way google has it set up, is better for all users (including those that want to play those types of games), but less attractive for developing games like farmville and the like. If the user wants to play the game, there's a seperate tab for all of the games to post their crap to. It will not go on the feeds and will not get in the way of anything else. I imagine this will be bad for zynga and the like because spamming people who don't play games is their preferred method of advertising.

  • Which is worse? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by JustAnotherIdiot ( 1980292 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:16PM (#37120840)
    Google+ has no users, but Facebook has no users worth talking to.
    I think I'll take Google+ if I'm forced to choose one.

  • G+'s biggest strength may be its biggest weakness (Score:3)

    by Bloodwine77 ( 913355 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:20PM (#37120902)

    Google+'s biggest strength is that it puts circles front-and-center so that you can control who sees your posts on a per-post basis. Yes you can do the same in Facebook, but it is a tedious workflow in Facebook.

    I am starting to think this may be Google+'s biggest weakness as well. Now that people can share posts with sub-sets of their friends list with ease, Google+ overall feels less active. I wonder how much of that feeling of inactivity has to do with not being aware of private, walled off conversations between members of your circles. Honestly, how many close friends do you have on Facebook or Google+? It is more than likely that the bulk of your friends lists / circles are acquaintances or friends of friends and those are the people that you are less likely to share posts with ... and vice-versa.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by smbell ( 974184 )
      Google+, if you don't see your friends posting often, their talking about you.

  • There are a few things G+ is missing to seriously contend, at least in my eyes, with FB... for me and most of my friends.

    First, I can do without pretty much all the apps, games, and all those other random application things that I have to keep adding to my "block posts from [app name]."

    However, one of the biggest things I use G+ for, apart from general communication, is events/coordination type stuff. If G+ had a decent "Create an event" thing, that'd be a major plus [hahaha...]

    On the communication side...

  • Sad (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Beelzebud ( 1361137 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:31PM (#37121040)
    It's sad watching people argue over which advertising conglomerate they want to give all their personal information to.

  • Probably the biggest problem is I can't upload pictures from either of my iDevices. There isn't a Google+ app in the App Store so one of the things I do (upload pics) isn't available. I am on it since my daughter is using Google+ more than Facebook.

    [John]

  • On a lark, I created a username and accounts on both Yahoo and Google, then using a name something along the lines of "Honeypot", created an account on Facebook using one of the email addresses (Y! I believe). I then added a bunch of contacts in the address book of both Yahoo and Gmail, different people in each address book. In short order, I began seeing ads within Facebook while logged into the honeypot address suggesting I friend people from the address books of the account NOT tied to the Facebook acco

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Dahamma ( 304068 )

      I don't get why Google feels the need to come up with G+ and compete with Facebook. Stick to fscking search, stick to what you're best at. I don't understand this Microsoft mentality of "Oh, we didn't have this first and make money with it? Lets do one of our own! And fire the people in charge of marketing and precognition. They should have known social networking would become such a huge hit."

      The problem is that Facebook is basically becoming a walled garden service for many Internet users now. Message/m

  • In terms of market for casual gaming companies, Google+ does indeed have "no users".

    1) G+ launched without gaming integration, so no one on G+ went there for the gaming, and thus can't be considered a "user" from the perspective of gaming companies.

    2) G+ launched without gaming integration, and was a major reason many early adopters started using it. Many of G+'s users are NOT users from the perspective of the gaming companies because they went to G+ specifically to get away from the gaming spam.

    It's fru

  • I use FB Purity. Awesome.
    http://www.fbpurity.com/ [fbpurity.com]
    That and a couple other tweaks in FF makes FB a reasonably enjoyable experience.

  • "because they don't have any users,"

    is a bit better presented as...

    "Google ['s game revenue cut] is at 5% because they don't have any [gaming] users,"

    This intent is a bit less hyperbolic, and truer to the intent of the statement. Not that Facebook has been overly honest in their war with Google, but they aren't ignoring the Google+ userbase either.

    • "Google ['s game revenue cut] is at 5% because they don't have any [gaming] users,"

      Does Google+ require that games on their system use their billing system? Facebook does, but it's not clear if Google does. With Google's Schmidt commanded to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee on September 21 on Google's antitrust issues, I'd be surprised if Google did require that. 5% is a reasonably competitive price for a payment service. At 30%, you look into handling your own credit card payments.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by blair1q ( 305137 )

      They don't have any gaming users because they don't have any gaming.

      But they seem to be pwning Mark Zuckerberg all day long.

  • HHGTTG (Score:3)

    by Faux_Pseudo ( 141152 ) <Faux.Pseudo@gm[ ].com ['ail' in gap]> on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:39PM (#37121164)

    he is correct. The Hitchhikers Guide shows us there is no mone, no people, no sex and therfore no users.

  • Everyone who's ever intensively played a 'social game' on Facebook knows the simple truth: they're surrounded by fake accounts. For over two years I managed in excess of 40 Facebook accounts without ever being flagged... I presumed most of my 'friends' were fake as well. Even now the accounts are just sitting there, untouched, unused, but inflating FB's user numbers.

    I recognize I was cheating. It was wrong and I shouldn't have done it. For my actions, I've chosen to exile myself from FB games altogethe

  • Nice try (Score:3)

    by Charliemopps ( 1157495 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @12:47PM (#37121260)
    Facebooks the most hated company on the internet... proven by several polls now. Their on their way out. If Google acted anything like Microsoft does, Facebook would have been dead years ago. It's only a matter of time.

  • I want to delete my facebook profile and switch to google+ fulltime. Unfortunately almost all of my friends and family still use facebook, though some of them have google+ accounts aswell. What exactly can I do to get them to switch over? No one wants to use a service that has no activity and no users. It's a chicken and egg problem.

    For the time being I've gone back to using email almost exclusively. I never used 99% of the facebook features anyway, I disabled the wall, didnt post pictures, etc.. I basicall

  • I wish my sites had "No Users!" I'd be very pleased with the "No Users" count of 25 million.

    I'm happy when there are 300 active users...

  • FB Purity [fbpurity.com] uses your browser to implement a whitelist of applications that get to your feed, so even as new games are "released" (usually in the case of Zynga, poorly reimplemented or bought) you won't see their spam unless you specifically allow them.

  • Well, Facebook has no FACE!

  • Facebook will read my Twitter status and add it to my wall. Google+ needs the same ability so I can post to all three services at the same time from my mobile.

  • It's the signal to noise ratio. So far, in my experience, FB has more over-all content, and even more "good" content numerically, but I have to filter through so much garbage to get to it. It's too much work. With G+ the noise level hasn't gotten that high yet, even though G+ has less content.

  • It's users have no privacy, no real opt-out, no right to it's own content.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @01:49PM (#37121868)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • They have at least 1 user (Score:3)

    by FictionPimp ( 712802 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @02:08PM (#37122030) Homepage

    I use google+ and I don't have a facebook account. It is slowly replacing twitter for me. I love it. I have about 50 people in my circles.

  • It hasn't even opened up registration to new users (Score:3)

    by Flipao ( 903929 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2011 @05:15PM (#37123980)
    Can we please get an objective article on these issues from time to time?,earlier today we got what was essentially a corporate ad praising Android's African success and now we get the flipside with some Facebook PR guy defending his home turf.

    G+ is nowhere near close to being a threat to Facebook yet, we know that, but it does have 25 million registered users in what is essentially a closed beta test.

    Predictions this early are useless and will all but reflect individual bias, preferences and loyalties. If you feel like it. you can look at past precedents like Gmail (hit) or Wave (miss) and get a slight idea of where things are going; a Facebook exec is the last person I'd trust to tell me how Google+ is doing.

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