Thursday, July 7, 2011

The competitive prospects of Google — Tech News and Analysis

The obvious competitor Google is taking on with Google+ is Facebook. But there are lots of other applications that might be affected as well. The "Hangouts" app is getting attention for its drop-dead-simple way of allowing users to set up and use multi-party video chats. How Google can track who is speaking at the moment, and needs to have the audio feed, is somewhat amazing. But the issue then becomes whether "Hangouts" can become a popular business tool for multi-party videoconferencing.

That might both stimulate demand for other business-class services, as well as reduce demand for consumer grade video chat services or applications. A survey of 451 GigaOm readers suggests the notion of competition with Skype (especially for video calls), as well as Facebook (social networking) is where the biggest upside for Google+ might be, and where competitors might feel the most pressure.

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