Is Google the solution to Facebook?

We all know the issues with Facebook and its changing privacy settings. Facebook has gone some way to addressing these concerns but for many people, myself included, the trust has gone.  Antoher problem with Facebook is the way it blurs the distinction between types of friends, contacts, colleagues etc.  Basically, they are all lumped in together so that messages intended for your Facebook friends can also been seen by your Facebook colleagues.  This is one of the reasons I closed my Facebook account last year - I did not feel comfortable having an online spaced co-populated by friends, old college and school acquaintances, students, colleagues and ex-colleagues. ( I recently opened a new Facebook account but only for research purposes).  It's probably a sign of my age but email, LinkedIn, Twitter and the telephone seem to serve me well enough for the moment.

However, the news/rumour that Google is about to launch a Facebook competitor (Google Me?) is interesting.  As is the Slideshare presentation below from Paul Adams, a UX person at Google (thanks to Katie Piatt for alerting me to this via Twitter) which describes how our social networks work in the real world and why Facebook is not sophisticated enough to deal with them.  Perhaps Google Me will allow us to reflect our multi-faceted identities online.  There are a number of major hurdles Google would have to overcome if it is to succeed on this front:

• Facebook has approaching 500 million active users.  Amongst certain demographics and in some geographies it is firmly entrenched.  Will enough of these people switch to another network?
• LinkedIn is the online weapon of choice for business networking.  Same question as above;
• Google does not have a good track record in this space.  Google Wave and Google Buzz.  Perhaps Gmail will be the way in as long as they don't misjudge users again as with Buzz;
• Do enough people care about Facebook's privacy issues enough for them to switch?  I'm not sure they do.

The Real Life Social Network v2

View more documents from Paul Adams.