Social network

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The floodgates are officially opening this weekend as Google is giving everyone 150 invites to Google Plus.  Pop them into your Twitter and Facebook streams to get your friends signed up.

Here’s an invite link for our readers not yet signed up (looks like ours are going pretty fast!
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A new extension called Start Google Plus brings functionality of Twitter and Facebook to Google+. The extension not only allows you to post to all three social networks, but puts Twitter and Facebook into your Google+ stream too.

Another cool feature Start Google Plus offers is the ability to import your Facebook photos. SGP is available on Chrome and Firefox. Check out a few photos of the extension after the break. (via Lifehacker)

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We have already seen snippets of code revealing Games is headed to Google+, but this morning it has been confirmed. SlashGear reports on the Google+ help page there is talk about a Games stream, where users can find updates from shared games. Google+ Games will have a sharing aspect, and the Games stream will sum up what your friends have shared from within those games.There is no word on when this will be available.
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A new extension Google+Facebook adds your Facebook newsfeed right into Google+. As you can see in the screenshot above, a Facebook icon is placed right next to the home icon at the top of the page. While it doesn’t give you all the functionality of Facebook, it’s a nice tool to have to update your status and check out the latest news from your friends that haven’t moved to Google+.

Google+Facebook was developed using the Crossrider framework, a framework that is used to build an extension across all three popular browsers: Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer. While we wish the extension was up on the Chrome Web Store, for those of us who use Chrome, it sadly isn’t. For now we’ll have to hit up the download that is available on Crossrider. Check out Crossrider’s demonstration of Google+Facebook after the break.

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At this point, it seems pretty obvious that Google means business with the Google Plus platform. Besides all of the other areas Plus has engulfed, it looks like Google is heading into the gaming realm.  The following code snippet was found in the web page code

“have sent you invites and more from Google+ Games”

So now Google is taking on Microsoft’s Xbox and Apple’s Gamecenter. Perhaps Google might want to lower the barrier to entry..
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Our invites came in and we’re up and running.  Here’s the initial reactions:

The first annoying thing is that Google hasn’t allowed Apps for Domains in yet.  They are “working on it”.  If you are like me and have your life in a Google Domain account this is a major pain.  I’m going to have to reconnect to everyone and they are going to have to put me in their circles all over again.  Bad start.

Once signed in, the interface is very “Facebook feeling” Google has found a lot of people who know me or are in my contacts so adding them to circles is easy.  Unfortunately my gmail.com account has a lot of people from school (when I used it last) and not a lot of the people I deal with on a day to day basis.

Friends seem to be coming in from way back in history – very Facebook like.

It will be interesting to see how Google keeps people coming in and more importantly coming back.

Because I can’t stay logged into this and my normal Apps Google account at the same time, it won’t get used very much.  I imagine there are a lot of power users in this exact same boat.  I wonder what Google’s plan for this is.  I’m hoping there is going to be a merge button at some point in the future.

Overall, I have to say that the product feels very good…like if all of my Facebook Friends came in, I’d probably leave Facebook immediately.  But how do I use both at the same time?

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The folks at Fusible have been doing some sleuthing on the possibility of Google putting together a social network based on photos.  They found that Google has trademarked the name Photovine with the following under the following areas:

Goods and Services IC 009. US 021 023 026 036 038. G & S: Computer software
IC 038. US 100 101 104. G & S: Communication services, namely, transmission of visual images and data by telecommunications networks, wireless communication networks, the Internet, information services networks and data networks

IC 042. US 100 101. G & S: Non-downloadable computer software

IC 045. US 100 101. G & S: On-line social networking services

Additionally, a company who uses MarkMonitor to anonymously register domain names has bought photovine.com from a private holder.  Google is one of the companies that uses MarkMonitor.

Clearly that spells out a photo-sharing social network.

So, are Picasa/Picnik online services about to get more social under a new brand name?  All signs point to ‘yes’.

(Google Weddings, a mashup of similar Google services pictured above)
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