Google and Social – Do They Compute?

We remember coming across a presentation by a Google employee that made its way viral, leading many to presume that the company was hard at work on a competitor to Facebook. What we didn’t realize is that this presentation by Paul Adams, a UX engineer for Google, was given an entire year ago. It was, and still is, a relevant and impressive work on how social networks work in real life. With the launch of Google+, it also happens to give credence to those long ago rumors that Google was indeed working on their latest take on social.

Google+’s launch comes not long after the company rolled out the +1 social sharing widget for publishers and a similarly named web search option where users can recommend organic search listings. Also as part of the Google+ launch comes news that the company’s recent user interface update, the black navigation bar that appears on the top of the page across various Google services when signed in, is here to stay. The bar is but one of many cosmetic and functional changes to their core properties and offerings, e.g., maps and places. Taken together, Google+ is not just a new network but an overhaul to Google that happens to include a new social application.

The problem of course is that Google has a relatively poor track record with consumer facing launches, most notably in social. Among other things, the company really struggles with branding. Apple operates one of the most impressive brand architectures, even if their nomenclature can yield some confusion and snickers. Allowing their MySpace competitor to go into production, carrying the engineers name who designed it certainly didn’t help them get off to a great start. Orkut, though, was only their first. They followed that up with Wave and Buzz. The former people waved good-bye to and the latter people told to buzz off. As for “plus,” it’s not quite obvious what it means. Their social sharing functionality +1 contains the “+.” Does it mean add me or me too as people often use the moniker. Who would like to go tonight? People will reply to the group me or often +1. Is it a voting metric? Does it mean, for example that you want to vote it up? That seems to make sense for the search results, but the problem is that it’s not intuitively social.

A second and more obvious problem with the + project is a small little thing called Facebook. TechCrunch’s MG Siegler, who had a chance to see the new initiative first hand writes, “From the little that I’ve seen so far, Google+ is by far the best effort in social that Google has put out there yet.” Other reporters take a slightly more negative tone, such as a Silicon Alley Insider who quips, “Google’s Launch Of Google + Is, Once Again, Deeply Embarrassing — Facebook Must Be Rolling Its Eyes.” Henry Blodgett, who runs SAI, writes in the piece, “To hear Google’s engineering boss Vic Gundotra tell it, though, you’d think social networks had yet to be invented.” The publication also jabs at Google’s use of Facebook satisfaction studies as a reason for believing a new social product is needed. Is baking + into search, though, the same as Microsoft baking Internet Explorer into Windows?

So what does Google+ do (differently) besides look great? As the Times reports, Google’s foray tries to improve and differentiate itself by focusing on more effective group communication; not surprising as group segmentation was the focus of the aforementioned presentation by Paul Adams. Is that enough? Social is what Facebook started as, but it’s identity and sharing (via the social web / social graph) that has noted analyst Lou Kerner calling them the second internet. While Facebook is the biggest threat, it’s not because of their stranglehold on social. It’s because any launch in the social realm will automatically be compared to Facebook.

Ironically, the news of Google’s long speculated social project happens to coincide with news that Specific Media has purchased MySpace for $35 million. The once but not future king of social networking has come down in value from its $580 million purchase price by NewsCorp almost six years ago. Given that its ad revenues conservatively top $50mm, it isn’t a bad gamble by Specific Media even if it is an unprofitable (now) and depreciating asset. At more than 10x the peak users of MySpace, it’s hard to imagine that Facebook will suffer a similar fate any time soon, even with the 10x larger in revenue Google hoping to chip away at their business.

Regardless of what happens with +, we don’t envy Google. The company is fighting three major battles – mobile, business software applications, and social. Say this about Google, the company is nothing if not ambitious. It’s tough enough to undertake more than one major initiative let alone three, when your competitors just happen to be Apple, Microsoft, and Facebook. Despite their social track record, Google has made impressive strides on the first two fronts. It is just hard to imagine them being able to tackle the third with the technology culture they have in place.