6 ms·

Google Plus's UI is still way behind Facebook. It would be a lot easier for Facebook to fix their holes with privacy(essentially copying Plus's Circles) than f

by zaidf 15y ago

Google Plus's UI is still way behind Facebook. It would be a lot easier for Facebook to fix their holes with privacy(essentially copying Plus's Circles) than for Google to become more like Facebook. We needed someone to put pressure on facebook to give more granular privacy control. To the extent that Plus pushes Facebook in that direction, I'm happy! Plus' other features like Hangouts are nice but nothing really that I missed enough to drop Facebook. Privacy is one thing that I can see myself moving away from facebook for.

sgk284 15y ago
Any examples of how G+ is behind in UI? I find the G+ interface orders of magnitude more pleasant to use than FB. It's not perfect, but it handles all of the same use cases that I used FB for, and does so in a simpler more sensible way.
- zaidf 15y ago
  They utilize buttons with three different colors: green, blue and red. The stream is a lot more cluttered than Facebook. As an example, this is what I see next to a name in the stream: Fname Lname - 4:17 PM - Mobile - Public Compared to Facebook: Fname Lname There are lots of such details that facebook has right--mostly because they have been around a lot longer. I am sure Google Plus will eventually get it right(facebook's very first design really sucked, too). Another example: when someone posts a picture, it seems to appear pretty big versus Facebook. It's an issue for me because most often I am not interested in pictures in my feed so a smaller version--like facebook--is preferred. If it looks like something of interest, I'll click on it. When I do click on a picture in my stream, I am taken to a page with black background with all comments appearing on right in white/gray. It shows the non-standard nature of the Google UI which I personally dislike. Facebook's UI may be boring. But most things I use a lot are boring and non-shiney. All this comes from someone who really, really hates facebook for purposely holding back privacy features. I have pretty much resorted to not posting anything that may be offensive to a 5 year old kid.
  - BrianBerk 15y ago
    > It's an issue for me because most often I am not interested in pictures in my feed so a smaller version--like facebook--is preferred. I like the bigger pictures, cause I never was able to really use the tiny pictures on FB. But yea, I think if you are focusing on designing something so that users can easily skip over stuff something has gone horribly wrong.
kmavm 15y ago
> It would be a lot easier for Facebook to fix their holes with privacy(essentially copying Plus's Circles) than for Google to become more like Facebook. Circles are friend lists, a feature Facebook has had for three years. Facebook's friend lists actually do a few things that circles currently don't: for instance, you can post to the union of a set of friend lists with specific people excluded. They're de-emphasized in the UI because, despite many iterations on it, and a prompt to this day to add new friends to a list, the overwhelming majority of users have never created or used one. The functionality has been there for years, so it is surprising to me that Google is pushing an essentially failed Facebook feature as their big differentiator.
- zaidf 15y ago
  for instance, you can post to the union of a set of friend lists with specific people excluded. Yup, I use this feature increasingly. I especially like the "Only Me" feature to share stuff I don't necessarily want to share with any of my friends but want to remember years down the line.
- rmc 15y ago
  A failed feature? Does it have less space than a nomad and no wifi? I'm sure it'll never catch on.
  - kmavm 15y ago
    It could very easily be the case that Facebook's difficulty in popularizing friend lists was somehow path-dependent: e.g., FB users weren't using it from the beginning, so users had a different model in mind. We agree, I am not saying that circles are hopeless just because they've already been tried. There seems to be a bogus meme propagating that Facebook doesn't have the functionality at all, though. You can do this stuff on Facebook if you're so inclined.
- MatthewPhillips 15y ago
  Facebook doesn't have circles. All Facebook relationships are built on a friend request, which Google+ doesn't have. You can't add strangers to a Facebook list; they are not the same thing.

by zaidf 15y ago

sgk284 15y ago

Any examples of how G+ is behind in UI? I find the G+ interface orders of magnitude more pleasant to use than FB. It's not perfect, but it handles all of the same use cases that I used FB for, and does so in a simpler more sensible way.

zaidf 15y ago
They utilize buttons with three different colors: green, blue and red. The stream is a lot more cluttered than Facebook. As an example, this is what I see next to a name in the stream: Fname Lname - 4:17 PM - Mobile - Public Compared to Facebook: Fname Lname There are lots of such details that facebook has right--mostly because they have been around a lot longer. I am sure Google Plus will eventually get it right(facebook's very first design really sucked, too). Another example: when someone posts a picture, it seems to appear pretty big versus Facebook. It's an issue for me because most often I am not interested in pictures in my feed so a smaller version--like facebook--is preferred. If it looks like something of interest, I'll click on it. When I do click on a picture in my stream, I am taken to a page with black background with all comments appearing on right in white/gray. It shows the non-standard nature of the Google UI which I personally dislike. Facebook's UI may be boring. But most things I use a lot are boring and non-shiney. All this comes from someone who really, really hates facebook for purposely holding back privacy features. I have pretty much resorted to not posting anything that may be offensive to a 5 year old kid.
- BrianBerk 15y ago
  > It's an issue for me because most often I am not interested in pictures in my feed so a smaller version--like facebook--is preferred. I like the bigger pictures, cause I never was able to really use the tiny pictures on FB. But yea, I think if you are focusing on designing something so that users can easily skip over stuff something has gone horribly wrong.

kmavm 15y ago

> It would be a lot easier for Facebook to fix their holes with privacy(essentially copying Plus's Circles) than for Google to become more like Facebook. Circles are friend lists, a feature Facebook has had for three years. Facebook's friend lists actually do a few things that circles currently don't: for instance, you can post to the union of a set of friend lists with specific people excluded. They're de-emphasized in the UI because, despite many iterations on it, and a prompt to this day to add new friends to a list, the overwhelming majority of users have never created or used one. The functionality has been there for years, so it is surprising to me that Google is pushing an essentially failed Facebook feature as their big differentiator.

zaidf 15y ago
for instance, you can post to the union of a set of friend lists with specific people excluded. Yup, I use this feature increasingly. I especially like the "Only Me" feature to share stuff I don't necessarily want to share with any of my friends but want to remember years down the line.
rmc 15y ago
A failed feature? Does it have less space than a nomad and no wifi? I'm sure it'll never catch on.
- kmavm 15y ago
  It could very easily be the case that Facebook's difficulty in popularizing friend lists was somehow path-dependent: e.g., FB users weren't using it from the beginning, so users had a different model in mind. We agree, I am not saying that circles are hopeless just because they've already been tried. There seems to be a bogus meme propagating that Facebook doesn't have the functionality at all, though. You can do this stuff on Facebook if you're so inclined.
MatthewPhillips 15y ago
Facebook doesn't have circles. All Facebook relationships are built on a friend request, which Google+ doesn't have. You can't add strangers to a Facebook list; they are not the same thing.