What are Circles ?
Google wants to make sharing online more like sharing in real life - different things with different people. For example, you might want to catch up with your pals about your drunken Saturday night out, but you don't necessarily want your parents in your chat. You can keep your conversations separate by putting your contacts into 'circles' such as 'Work crew', 'Uni mates' and 'Parents'.
Google+ hangouts
What are Hangouts?
As the name suggests, this feature is all about hanging out with your buddies, virtually, or couse. You can choose specific friends, or circles, to invite for a face-to-face video chat and anyone in the Hangout can invite others to join as well. According to Google's demo: "Until teleportation arrives, it's the next best thing". We're not sure about that - it's basically just video calling.
The Google+ project: Instant Upload
GOOGLE + +Huddle
What is Huddle ?
You know when you're trying to arrange a night out by having several different text conversations with a number of friends? If so, you'll know how long-winded and confusing it can become. The idea behind Huddle is that you can turn all these exchanges into one big group chat to save you time.
Privacy
Most social networks, Facebook included, have run into trouble over privacy concerns at some point or another, so what is Google+ doing to address it? You'll be able to alter your visibility settings so that only your name and photo will appear online to people that aren't in your network. However, if you're in a circle on a friend's public profile, then your picture will appear on there (but clicking on it wouldn't go anyway if your privacy settings are on). You'll be able to assign different levels of visibility to different aspects of your profile. You can also choose whether your profile is indexed by search engines and, as with Facebook, you'll be able to block people
Google Plus big feature is Backing up data
One of the biggest worries with uploading photos to Facebook is that one day the site will retire from public life, taking our cherished memories with it. Obviously canny computer users already make sure that anything they upload is backed up at home and likewise, Google+ has recognised that we don't all want to live exclusively in the clouds.
You can use Google Takeout (google.com/takeout) to download data from your Google+ products to your home computer - that includes PicasaWeb albums and photos, your Google profile, Google Contacts, Stream and er, Google Buzz.Easily available on Mobile
Supported by the Chrome, IE, Firefox and Safari browsers, Google+ will also be available on mobile devices - a vital element for any social networking platform. As well as sharing your thoughts and location from your mobile, you'll be able to check into places and make use of the group messaging feature, Huddle.
Making photo-sharing as simple as possible, images and videos taken on your phone will upload themselves automatically to Google+. That might sound a tad scary - what if you don't want everyone to see your snaps or footage? Don't panic - they'll be uploaded directly to a private album and you can then specify who (if anyone) you choose to share them with.
You can already download the Android app and there's an iOS 4+ app due to hit iTunes soon. You can also access the basic Google+ mobile site (m.google.com/app/plus) on Android handsets (1.5+) and Apple devices (iOS 3+) as well as on BlackBerry (6.0+), Nokia/Symbian and Windows Mobile. The Android app currently offers a wider range of functions than you'll see on the mobile sites.Making photo-sharing as simple as possible, images and videos taken on your phone will upload themselves automatically to Google+. That might sound a tad scary - what if you don't want everyone to see your snaps or footage? Don't panic - they'll be uploaded directly to a private album and you can then specify who (if anyone) you choose to share them with.
There are no tablet specific versions of the project at present, but this is something that Google plans to work on in the future.
When can I get it?
Google+ can currently only be accessed with a special Field Trial invitation, which Google has been sending out at random to Gmail users. There's no set date for a full launch, but we would guess that it won't be too long before Google+ goes live to everyone. In the meantime, you can check out the demo, as long as you have a Google ID.
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