The Google+ experience

When we think of Social Networking it's difficult not to think about Facebook. I've heard very different and interesting perspectives about what is the best platform between Twitter and Facebook and I came to the conlcusion that there's no such thing as a "best platform". They both can be very useful, depending on the purpose you're using them.

Still, I always thought that the concept of friendship in social media platforms is pretty standardized. Basically on Facebook every member of your network is equally your friend, a situation that is very far from reality. In real life you may want your best friend to know how much your boss is pissing you off and what a dumbass he is, but you surely don't want your boss to know that.

The new answer to the human need to socialize is brought you bythe Google giant, its name is Google+.

Google announced the project launching yesterday on its official blog and I strongly invite you to go there and to take a look about it. Until now 3 are the features that stand apart from previous social networking experience: Sparks, Hangouts, and Circles. The first one is a feed of the content you're really into, so when you're available, there will be always something to watch, read, or share. Hangouts is a video conference systems that lets your friends know you're free to hangout for a video chat. Then comes my favourite: Circles. It allows you to put different friends together, you can organize your relationships into groups such as "saturday night friends", "soccer friends", "colleagues", and so on. This helps users sharing the content they want just with the people they want.

Here you can take a look at the presenting video:

Now, I am a social media person and I actually can't wait to try Google+ in order to review it right here, but I will leave my last question for you. Do you think that this new patform is going to compete and somehow to contrast Facebook networking structure? Or is it just the same old thing with some new sparkling features? Tell me what you think.

Communication + Unity = Community

I have already mentioned social browsers in previous posts and I am aware that some of you already know what they are about, but there is still a vast majority of people that think the only purpose of such tools is to manage contacts easily. That is not the case of RockMelt.

This social browser not only allows you to use and manage Facebook and/or Twitter with less effort, but it really gives you the feeling of being part of something. It's not just because of the graphic interface and its perfect balance among eye-catchiness and functionality. It's not just because of its features, and certainly is not because it's "the new thing".

I've seen many "new things" vanish after few months, especially on the web. But, you know, every now and then somebody understands that social networks will not only be more and more accessible, they'll be the gate to the future web. In fact, when an user opens the RockMelt browsers, he/she automatically logs in Facebook/Twitter.

This shows how much the future Internet generation will be based on building and communicating community values, and that is why virtual social networks and the community concept will be more and more relevant at a personal level as well as at a business level. Organizations of various size are struggling to figure out the best way to be present on social networks. They are forgetting that it is not  just about being there, but it's about building a community.