Google+ Project: Real-life sharing, think again for the web

Internet search giant, Google, announced the project that will make it more social. The new project is known as Google+ Project.

What is Google+ or Google Plus

Google+ means “Google + You”, so it’s all about you, your friends, your videos and photos, your conversations and your interest. Google says that the online sharing is broken, and it aims to fix it and make it more social. Google+ is an extension of the existing Google Buzz and Profiles, with many new features that make sharing more useful.

We have seen Google take several wrong moves over the last few years, but it appears to have finally come up with a perfect and better solution with the Google+ project.  It aims at bringing a unique ‘web search functionality’ through a new social networking system, which comes with several new features.

Google+ Features

Google+ Project comes with numerous features that make it more unique from other social websites such as Facebook and Twitter etc.

New Google+ Logo and icons

Google has changed the logo and icons for its Google+ Projects. Starting from left: Circles, Hangouts, Home, Photos, Profile and Sparks

New Google+ Navigation Bar

The familiar gray strip that appears on the top of every Google page is turn into black, and several new options added on the bar like Google+ profile, viewing notifications and content sharing options. The notification system is similar to Facebook notifications, complete with a red number that increases with each additional notice.

Google+ Stream

Google+ Stream is a Feed page where users share their content and see what their friends share with you and his other friends. This feature is quite similar to the Facebook News Feed.

Google+ is divided into four main components: Circles, Sparks, Hangouts, and Mobile.

Google+ Circles

Google+ Circles is the Google’s version of the Twitter list or the Facebook friend list. Google+ Circles allows you to target specific sharing with the various social groups. Users can select multiple friends and drag-and-drop them into the circles or a new circle. This makes it easier to send stuff to your family, friends, colleagues and the entire world.

Google+ Sparks

Google+ Sparks is discovery and content recommendation engine where you can get the information about current trending content on various topics. You can also subscribe to the categories you’re interested as well as create a custom category and share with your friends.

Google+ Hangouts

Google+ Hangouts is a place where you can say hello to your family or friends face-to-face-to-face. It is Google group chat feature where you can start a hangout instead of directly asking a friend to join a group chat. A message goes out to their social circles at the same time and let them know that their friend is “hanging out.” Google has found in internal testing and result is that friends quickly join.

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Google+ Mobile

Mobile phone is the perfect content sharing accessory in these days. It always online, always with you and allows you to stay close with your closest friends. Users didn’t want just a mobile experience, so Google focused on things such as messaging, cameras, GPS to make your mobile phone even more personal.

Google+ Instant Upload and Location

Google+ Mobile allow users to share your location with every post and instant upload content such as pictures, videos etc with several options to either go public or stay private.

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Google+ Huddle

It is really hard in life to coordinate with friends and family in real-time. Every person has different schedule and plans that can change at any moment. Text messages and calls can work, but it is not quite solution for getting the gang together. So Google introduced +Huddle, a group messaging experience that  allow everyone in circle to know what’s going on, right this second.

[richvideo width=”630″ height=”388″ url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iA22daAstNg” uniqueid=”googleplus-huddle” title=’Google+ Huddle’ detail=’James introduces Sparks with a few thoughts on why we share the things we were interested in. Check out some ways we have been rethinking real-life sharing for the web at plus.google.com.’]

Google+ is now available on Android Market and the mobile web, and it’s coming soon to the App Store.

Currently, Google+ requires an invitation, but you can’t get one right now. “Google are testing Google+ with a small number of users, but it won’t be long before the Google+ project is ready for everyone,” explains Google.