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Google+ users may not be seeing a ton of action on the social network, but that’s partly intentional.
Google set up the network to let users share only with specific groups of friends, and that’s exactly what’s happening.
Bradley Horowitz, one of the leaders of the Google+ team, told Steven Levy at Wired:
There is actually twice as much private sharing as there is sharing that’s visible to everyone on the Internet. That’s why sometimes it looks like people sign up and then don’t come back. In fact, they’re sharing with small groups of people that they trust and love. It’s just not publicly visible. So there’s this sort of dark matter that the public can’t see.
So if you’re not seeing a lot of action on Google+, maybe you just don’t have enough friends there.
Horowitz maintains that the service is doing just fine, and says that “most” of the stories about usage leveling off or dropping “are based on the wrong data.” (Although he doesn’t come right out and deny it, either.)
He also admits that the service has a “noisy stream” problem for early adopters, where a few posters post so much that it overshadows information from everybody else. But more casual users are facing the opposite problem — not enough action.
Horowitz says Google has plans in place to address both problems.
Last week, Google opened Google+ to the general public and usage exploded, although it still trails far behind Facebook — and is still slightly behind MySpace.
Article source: SAI http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider/~3/jbLP3z0k6kc/a-lot-of-the-action-on-google-is-hidden-from-sight-says-google-2011-9