Wow! What I just saw is unbelievable.  As I mentioned in my previous post, Google is definitely up for creating a consistent look among various Google products.  Entire Google team is working on creating/updating its entire range of products in a better looking beautiful looking feature rich products.

What Google has released today are two product updates. Google+ app for Android gets a huge face lift and Google Reader get the same consistent look we are slowly becoming used to with Gmail, Search and all.  Google reader also receives Google+ integration.  But that update is probably another post in itself.

In this article we want to see what Google+ updated app brings on the table.  Let’s see what’s new in this version:

  1. Completely new app and new visual design.  New Home screen design puts the notification in top right corner which were previously in the bottom.
     
  2. Press and hold a post in the stream to +1, share or mute it.  The stream also get a UI tweak.
  3. Brand new posting UI.  Posts with photos show more content, covers most of the area as far as possible.  You can also quickly toggle the location sharing.
  4. Hangouts has all new controls.
  5. Messenger also show items with bigger pictures and provides a cleaner design.
  6. Profile tab also shows more information in tabbed format.
  7. The album view receives a huge change.  All your albums are now displayed here instead of hopping around different screens.  When you open an album the photos take full space on the screen which give a stunning look at all your photos.
  8. When you go to the circles, it shows a preview of who all are in those circles.  And when you go to one particular circle, it shows you a list of all the members in that circle.
  9. Among other updates is the support for Google Apps users, ability to sign out and add people to a circle from circle profiles.
With all these updates, it feels like a release of brand new product.  Doesn’t it feel like a superior social network altogether?
Now the only problem is that being such a beautiful range of features and close integration with other Google products, Google+ is still loosing users.  The real issue in my opinion is to bring people over from Facebook to use Google+.  For example, in my case, it was already hard to convince people to create a profile on Facebook, now it is again whole new story to bring them over to Google+.  The communities over at Facebook has become so matured and people have probably embraced the platform so well, that unless Google+ provides something ridiculously different, there is no real incentive for users to migrate.
I just wish Google has some trump cards to play against Facebook in this social battle.  Nonetheless, if you have already migrated or planning to migrate to Google+, now is the chance to start using this on your Android phone with this updated app.


 

Let us know in comments if you were able to bring over your friends from Facebook.  And how you did that.

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