The AdNews NGen blog: Socially Overcooked

On June 28th we saw the launch of Google+ into the social network sphere, and while this is exciting to have such a big company like Google take on the likes of Facebook and Twitter, do we really need one more social network to distract us?

People are already the kings of multi-tasking; watching TV while checking emails on their laptop or iPad, with their phone sitting next to them constantly updating their Facebook and/or Twitter stream. Over 50% of Australians are members of Facebook. Your mum is trying to add you to pry on your private life, but you've decided that this is not a good idea – you see her enough, she doesn't need to know how sloshed you got  on the weekend and which guy you went home with Saturday night. So we know that we can (kind of) handle more than one thing at once!

We are connected in every way and there are a bazillion sites explaining how to reduce the stress and complexity of our lives, all while keeping up with our never ending to-do list. The level of stressed out and exhausted people in the workplace has grown exponentially since our grandparents were in the same position. They didn't have any distracting phone alarms going off every 10 minutes, if they were walking down the street that's exactly what they were doing. Nobody was trying to call them, they weren't updating their Facebook status as they walked and they definitely weren't trying to find out where the hell they were on a maps app on their phone.

The 'share this!' bar on nearly every website you visit has over 300 networks and services you can share with. Imagine if you were a member of every one of those services. Your inbox would be overflowing with updates that you couldn't keep up with. I follow quite a few RSS feeds and because everyone is constantly updating their blogs with the new cool thing or interesting happenings in their lives there are 1000+ unread items that I just can't seem to sit down and read properly. It's a never-ending cycle.

Google+ is invite only at the moment, and I read last night that invitations have been halted because of an overwhelming number of invite requests. It's no surprise there have been a lot of requests; to produce a social network that could maybe stand a chance against Facebook and add a few new features is quite a feat, so I can't wait to try it out when they become a little less inundated. I just hope it's not as disappointing as Buzz. Facebook has only recently dethroned Google as the most visited site in the world so it will be interesting to see whether Google can topple them off again and continue the Google  vs. Facebook fight to own the world.

So to answer my original question, do we really need another social network? Yes, because it gives us a bit of variety and more options. In a perfect world social networks would be made to interact with other social networks, and we wouldn't need to stick to the one platform and exclude people elsewhere. Some people might like Google's way of being social more than Facebook, it's all up to personal choice. A little change can't hurt right?

Sarah Symes
UM Sydney