(http://readwrite.com/files/styles/800_450sc/public/fields/SAY_1617.jpg) With a whirlwind of announcements at its Google I/O developers conference this week, Google's vast suite of social products is finally starting to look like it was created by a single company and not cobbled together via a series of haphazard acquisitions. Here are the highlights of what's changed:
(http://readwrite.com/files/SAY_1614.jpg)
Hangouts: Google Messaging, Unmessy At Last Google is finally doing something to prune its thicket of messaging products. Let's start with a look at the various chat and messaging products that were due for some much-needed spring cleaning: (http://readwrite.com/files/th21%20300%20hangouts%20google%20may.jpg)
- Google Talk. Talk was Google's Instant Message client. It's also called Google Chat or "GChat," by many people who didn't even know it was called Talk to begin with.
- Google+ Hangouts. Hangouts was Google+'s group video chat service, from the social network's launch back in 2011.
- Google+ Messenger: A product redundant with Google Talk, Messenger was Google+'s own IM client.
- Google Voice: Google's cult-hit digital telephony client, Voice allows users to route all their calls to one phone number. Google Voice works for calls and texting both on desktop and on its much-neglected mobile apps for iOS and Android.
Now, Hangouts becomes the messaging mini-umbrella under the social mega-umbrella of Google+. Hangouts, now available (http://www.google.com/+/learnmore/hangouts/) across desktop and mobile, will unify Google Talk, Google+ Messenger and the old Hangouts video chat service of yore.
According to a statement from Nikhyl Singhal (http://www.theverge.com/2013/5/15/4318830/inside-hangouts-googles-big-fix-for-its-messaging-mess), Google's head honcho of real-time communications, Google Voice will be folded into Hangouts too (Yay!), though there's no word on when.
(http://readwrite.com/files/th21%201280%20new%20gplus.jpg) Google+ Gets A
Lot Of Love Messaging may have been the messiest area of Google's social services, but Google+ is the big umbrella that covers them all. Amidst the company's epic 3-hour-plus Google I/O keynote (http://readwrite.com/2013/05/15/google-i-o-2013-keynote-live-blog-with-live-stream) yesterday, Google+ guru Vic Gundotra announced approximately one million updates to Google+, the social network that the company launched two years ago. Okay, he pegged the number at 41... but that's almost a million. (http://readwrite.com/files/SAY_1675.jpg) The updates are extensive. As a regular Google+ user, it's actually difficult to get a sense for what changed, since the redesign looks and feels right in stride with Google's recent overall changes in user interfaces that runs from Google+ to Google Glass to Google Now and Android. So here's a list of some of the most notable of the 41 updates:
- A multi-column layout. This can be toggled off, if you're still into the Blogger single-column-era.
- Photos and videos get even bigger. Google is really into making media massive (http://readwrite.com/2013/03/06/google-update-adds-crazy-big-cover-photos-other-stuff) - and we would be too if the average person knew how to share properly high-res photos.
- New animations. Things are flipping and sliding all over the place in there.
- A third dimension. You can scroll up and down through your social stream, but Google wants you to be able to scroll in too. Now you can take a deeper dive on a given Google+ post -or is it a Card? I think we're suppose to call everything Cards now -- via related hashtags, which will lead you to more content of interest. It will also take you further down the Google+ rabbit hole, of course.
- (http://readwrite.com/files/Screen%20Shot%202013-05-16%20at%2012.55.14%20PM_1.png) Lots of treats for photographers. Google+ has a thriving community of awesome photogs, and Google is keen to do right by them. Photos in Google+ now have all sorts of cool bells and whistles. A few I'm particularly stoked about include "auto highlight," which de-emphasizes duplicate and blurry pics, automatically picking the best shot out of a batch. I've yet to test this extensively, but since I have a habit of bracketing (taking multiple shots at different exposures) - even on my phone - choosing the best photo of a set can be a major timesuck. This feature could help there. Another feature, "Auto Awesome," can stitch together shots in a series to make a playful Photobooth-esque picture or even a Vine-like animated gif.
(http://readwrite.com/files/th21%20800%20photos%20gplus%20may.jpg)
For a full breakdown of Google's social updates, hit the company's official blog post (http://googleplusproject.blogspot.com/2013/05/new-google-stream-hangouts-and-photos.html)or just cruise around in Google+ for a while. The the social network has been the butt of many a joke over the last few years, and we're happy to see Google take the time to spruce things up a little.
(http://readwrite.com/files/SAY_1621.jpg)
Photos by Nick Statt for ReadWrite. Via: ReadWrite