I am as unhappy about this development as anyone. I don't understand the insistence on real names, not just because I think it's wrong, but I just don't understand what the motivation is. What's the upside?
Here's the only thing I could come up with:
Community. This early in its life, they don't want Google+ to become a cesspool of fake/joke accounts, youtube comments, spam, and "brands." They want it to be a real place for real people to share about real things. They don't want it to become Myspace. [Edit: I think you can also see this emphasis on noise reduction in how Circles are set up and how game notifications aren't part of your stream unless you want them to be.]
But I hope the plans are bigger. I hope they're just going for a nice clean introduction for a large enough user base, while temporarily marginalizing edge cases in order to give the mainstream a pleasant initial experience, so they can leverage that user base into a more successful version of what they tried with Buzz and Wave: an open, standards-based interoperable social networking environment that's more like the open web than a closed social network.[1]
The fact is, if they're planning on opening it up eventually, there's no stopping pseudonymous/anonymous activity or brands or even spam to some degree.
That's my optimistic fanboy take on it. I just don't see what else they get out of the policy. I definitely don't buy the "it's for advertising" line. They don't need your real name for that. And it just seems like too much of an obvious backlash and logistical mess to have to deal with unless they have a good, large, long-term reason.
I would argue that to develop many communities a degree of anonymity is required. An insistence of real names will mean a great many things will simply not be discussed or shared, whether it's because people are living under political or religious oppression or because itβs too dangerous or even embarrassing for them to do so without anonymity. Some of my friends fall into this category and discuss things online which they would not discuss in public because it would leave them open to discrimination, cost them jobs or make them targets of harassment. Offering people anonymity is nothing new- when interviewed by newspapers they have always been given the opportunity to use pseudonyms for example.
I'm not saying that Google is evil for having a real name policy or even that I want them to change it. They can do what they want - but my friends and I will never use their service as a result. I just want to point out that everything comes at a cost.
I am as unhappy about this development as anyone. I don't understand the insistence on real names, not just because I think it's wrong, but I just don't understand what the motivation is. What's the upside?
Here's the only thing I could come up with:
Community. This early in its life, they don't want Google+ to become a cesspool of fake/joke accounts, youtube comments, spam, and "brands." They want it to be a real place for real people to share about real things. They don't want it to become Myspace. [Edit: I think you can also see this emphasis on noise reduction in how Circles are set up and how game notifications aren't part of your stream unless you want them to be.]
But I hope the plans are bigger. I hope they're just going for a nice clean introduction for a large enough user base, while temporarily marginalizing edge cases in order to give the mainstream a pleasant initial experience, so they can leverage that user base into a more successful version of what they tried with Buzz and Wave: an open, standards-based interoperable social networking environment that's more like the open web than a closed social network.[1]
The fact is, if they're planning on opening it up eventually, there's no stopping pseudonymous/anonymous activity or brands or even spam to some degree.
That's my optimistic fanboy take on it. I just don't see what else they get out of the policy. I definitely don't buy the "it's for advertising" line. They don't need your real name for that. And it just seems like too much of an obvious backlash and logistical mess to have to deal with unless they have a good, large, long-term reason.
[1]: http://radar.oreilly.com/2011/07/google-plus-social-backbone...