When Will Facebook Sue Google Over +1?

In: Facebook|Social Media

19 Jul 2011

There’s been a ton of hype flying around lately about Google+ and how Google’s +1 button is beating out Twitter’s retweet button but here’s the thing. Even though Google+ is a fairly blatant copy of Facebook, the real kicker is that they stole the whole +1 thing from Facebook. What am I talking about? Yes, I heard you ask yourself that. Well, I present Facebook’s +1 that was around way before Google ever came up with the idea.

 

Please click the Google +1 button. ;)



  • http://www.facebook.com/wakesites Wake Sites

    png’s don’t lie…

    • http://www.socialidentities.com Hugh Briss

      Not this one anyway.

  • http://twitter.com/kgrey38 kgrey38

    “+1″ has long been a way to briefly communicate agreement and support, e.g. on forums.  Just saying.

    • http://www.socialidentities.com Hugh Briss

      Ah yes, but as soon as a big company starts using it they want to claim it as their own.

  • Duncan

    Hugh, how is google + “a blatant copy” of Facebook? They have different functions, different looks, they are organized differently. Does that mean that Facebook is a blatant copy of myspace, which is, in turn a blatant copy of Friendster, which is a deviant copy of the old AOL chat rooms?  I’m just not getting this notion that google + represents anything more devious than a next gen social network with different attributes. As for +1, that’s hardly a newly minted meme. The Zuck clearly went to a club at some point and got on the guest list +1.  It’s like Apple trying to trademark (unsuccessfully thus far) “App store.”  It’s an ambitious business move, if a somewhat shady one. I mean didn’t we “poke” each other on myspace too? When I was in the entertainment industry, we used to see this wave of ideas, (e.g., meteor movies, movies about young wizards/witches who go to schools of witchcraft, shit with dragons in it), and shrug. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I am one of those people who thinks Windows is a pretty blatant rip off of Mac (which is a less blatant rip off of the GUI interface on UNIX), but so what? It just makes the industry innovate faster.  Liked your post.  Peace, D.

    • http://www.socialidentities.com Hugh Briss

      ummm… Duncan, I was joking about the +1 thing. :)

      As for the blatant copy part, are you saying you don’t see the obvious similarities between the two, especially the layouts and functionality? Different functions and looks? Seriously? They’re virtually identical except Google calls their list “circles”.

      And for the record, I never said I had a problem with competition and I kind of like Google+ but I think they could have had their designers at least put a little effort into a UI that was unique.

      I see no similarity whatsoever between MySpace and Facebook so no, other than the fact that they both let people post stuff and comment, I wouldn’t call Facebook a blatant copy of MySpace.

     




My Facebook Page



Hugh on Twitter




Copyright © 2013 HughBriss.com
Hugh Briss is the owner of Social Identities.