Results tagged “socialnetworking”

It annoys the fuck out of me whenever I see commercials for a product or company who want you to follow them on Facebook or Twitter. Hey! Check it out, we're tweeting! We tweet! And put something on our wall too! Like us!

Aside from this annoyance, I could never quite put my finger on why social media doesn't work for companies, but Randy Murray nailed it:

The opposite is also true: businesses are not people. For a business to be social, it has to be focused and friendly, but it can never be your friend. I really like Apple products, I own Apple stock, but Apple isn't my friend. I don't need a social relationship with the company that made my car, where I shop for food, or the local dry cleaners. I do find it useful to get news and information from them, and someone to listen and act when I have a problem, but I really don't need another channel of happy talk from businesses.

via The Atlantic

So yes, Google is now in the social networking game with their new Google+. Some people have written about how well-designed it is from a UI perspective. Others have bashed them and dismissed the project.

Here's the deal. Google, as a company must do at some point, has to evolve. If they don't they'll end up like Alta Vista and all the other search engines from the 90's. This doesn't mean they'll succeed or that you have to join their club.

The problem is, they'll really not trying to evolve as much as they're growing like a cancer.

Apple has changed their focus and now makes more profit off of iPads, iPhones and iPods than they do on desktops. They also have no problem killing their darlings in the name of innovation and progress.

Google won't let go of search, search is their equivalent to Microsoft's Windows/Office cash cow.

I'm not a Microsoft basher by nature, they've just been setting themselves up to get slammed for their antics lately. When I got to work today, our CEO sent out a link on our email listserve - Windows Live Spaces Goes after MySpace. I trembled in anticipation of the revolutionary product imitation that Microsoft was launching now (As if tremebling in anticipation of Zune wasn't enough excitement for me).

From the VOX article:

Hotmail users, for example, can share their address book (Live Contacts) among their IM service (Live Messenger), web mail (Live Mail), and blog (Live Spaces) That integration facilitates security, with Live Spaces allowing users to specify who can contact them, see their profile, and access their blog. Live Spaces users can also select "gadgets" to personalize their pages - ad a news ticker, quote of the day or weather forecast, for example.

And here is a tasty screenshot of the product:

Friggin amazing Microsoft. You've done it again with another bland imitation of a successful original. Let's run through the list of 'features'.

Live Spaces integrates with these MS products:

• Live Mail (Hotmail) - I don't use my Hotmail account anymore
• Live Messenger - I use AOL Instant Messenger

Now when MySpace came out, people felt the need to switch from Frienster because it did things its competitor didn't. You could up media files (video, audio, flash) and you could 'hack' your profile page through Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) adjustments.

Now Microsoft is doing what it has done in the past and to only copy something on the surface. There's no underlying concept or vision for the future with their new product, other than, We are 800 pound gorilla, We need control this market, we get angry if can't win, grunt, grunt.

Now there are 2 train tracks with wrecks waiting to happen. First Zune, now Live Spaces. Hey Microsoft, how about making it a trifecta?

Take a look at Live Spaces.