But describing Google+ - the internet giant's new social networking service - is a different story. At the moment, coming from a keen user of g+, the word that springs to mind is quiet.
Remarkably, after a usage increase of 1200% the day it went public, G+ traffic has returned to pre-release levels.
Why? Here are three reasons why G+ isn't catching on.
1. Facebook's got connections
The social networking market is a very difficult one to get a foothold in, and the reason for that is in the name: SOCIAL. A network doesn't do it's job unless the nodes are all there, and a social network can't do it's job unless there are people there to socialise with. Without people, there's nobody to connect to, no matter how well the site is written. Of course, that's a vicious cycle - nobody on, nobody to talk to, no reason to join, nobody on.
2. Google+ isn't an obvious change
If that's the case, you might ask, then how did twitter manage? Although its usership is just one quarter the size of Zuckerberg's blueish brainchild, 200 million users is definitely respectable - moreover, being responsible for far more by way of trendsetting and generally being considered the 'new' network as opposed to the mainstream facebook which even your grandparents use, it is by no means irrelevant.
Twitter managed this because it's visibly different. It's not reciprocal. There's a character limit. There aren't any groups or pages. There are no games. There's a trend function. There are no comments. It is, and appears to be, a completely different format of social network, which gives it purpose, and gives facebook users a reason to switch, or at least start using both.
Don't get me wrong - G+ is very different as well. Any avid social networker will tell you that G+ is more like a souped up twitter than a cleaner facebook. It's a lot more about spreading ideas and microblogging than arranging to meet up and arguing. But it LOOKS the same. The central column is a newsfeed for what people are saying. Under each is a list of people who have '+1'd the post - in other words, liked it. Beneath that is a comment thread that goes one tier deep. The column on the left is also similar to facebook; as is the top bar. Eric Schmidt is right that G+ offers something completely different, but his website should be shouting that out as soon as you land, not hiding all the differences and making it look like the site it's trying to topple.
3. It's too good
By that, I don't mean that the internet community prefers slow, crashy, ugly sites that hoard every last byte of information about you. The advantage of G+ that I'm referring to is its sensible newsfeed. Instead of being clogged up with who's friends with who, who likes what and invites to events such as '2012' and '11:11:11, 11/11/11', We see what we want to see - what's being said by the people we're interested in. Unfortunately, it's the endless crud on a facebook newsfeed that makes it addictive, and ensures that you're never sitting there thinking about how little real news there is - which is exactly what you sit there thinking on G+.
I'm not saying plus is a bad product - I love it - but for a behemoth, Google really should be better at making it as easy as possible to switch, showing people how awesome their service is and at the very least shoving it down their throats.
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