Google yesterday launched its own social network in an attempt to challenge Facebook with a service that ties together all its existing sites including Gmail.
Google+ is structured in a remarkably similar way to Facebook, with profile pictures and news feeds forming a central core.
However, a user’s friends or contacts are grouped into specific circles of their choosing – as opposed to the common pool of friends typical on Facebook.
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Google+ started rolling out to a limited number of users on Tuesday in what the company is calling a field trial.
Only those invited to join will initially be able to use the service. Google did not say when it would be more widely available.
The service does not currently feature advertising.
To create Google+, the company went back to the drawing board in the wake of several notable failures, including Google Wave and Google Buzz, a micro-blogging service whose launch was marred by privacy snafus.
‘We learned a lot in Buzz, and one of the things we learned is that there’s a real market opportunity for a product that addresses people’s concerns around privacy and how their information is shared,’ said Google spokesman Bradley Horowitz.
Google drew more than one billion visitors worldwide to its websites in May, more than any other company, according to web analytics firm comScore.
But people are spending more time on Facebook – the average U.S. visitor spent 375minutes on Facebook in May, compared with 231minutes for Google.
