Craig Dodge - Blog

Google+ is just over a month old. On this one-month anniversary, many bloggers and other tech writers have shared their thoughts on how it's doing so far, and what it's future might be. I just want to add my own experiences and feelings,

Those of you who know me well, know the concerns I have about social networking sites. I wrote in Facebook - The Social Network about some of those concerns. In real life, we have different social networks which are not meant to be mixed, but online social networking sites put them all together. Things you share with your friends, you may not want to share with your mom.

When my good friend Cage Chung sent me an invitation to Google+, despite being totally opposed to joining Facebook or any other social networking site, I joined. I have always had good experiences with Google products and services, and they largely resolved my concerns about privacy and mixing of social groups with Circles and with easy-to-use privacy controls.

After 1 month, I'm happy with Google+, but I am not sure about its future.

Google+ had rapid growth in the first month, reaching 20 million users, but now what? They'd better open it to the public, and do a good job of convincing people why it's better than other choices, or it's going nowhere.

Reports show that the number of visits to Google+ and the time spent during each visit have declined. The articles say it's too soon to know if it's just a blip or the sign of something deeper, but my own experience has been similar. I'm not seeing as many posts or replies from my friends and acquaintenances. Too soon to tell, though, but just noticing.

So what do you think? What kind of future do you see for Google+? Can it draw people away from Facebook? Are there enough people willing to participate on several social networking sites? Has Google really made the case for why Google+ deserves your attention?

By the way, yes that's me in the picture.