After the launch of Facebook Subscribers with 2 giants Twitter and Google+ already existing in the same field of Followers, Following, and Circles, some thoughts that come up in users mind are who amongst these is the best and which one I should use.
Before predicting anything lets go in a bit detail about these couple of thoughts. It would be very early to come to any conclusion, but with a brief analysis below, a user will be able to judge the right and the better option according to his use. Google+ was launched some time back only and doesn’t carry as much features as Facebook do (with FB coming up with new features very frequently now). Twitter is also coming up with new features like that of lists, image sharing, and t.co URL shortener etc. So, definitely there is going to be tough competition among these three top social networks.
Facebook came up with Facebook Subscribers just couple of days back on September 14th, 2011 which is a feature similar to Twitter Followers. By using Facebook Subscribers FB users can now follow other FB users without being a friend of them and see their updates. Google+ has this feature already embeded into it.
Tools, Apps, Widgets and APIs for Subscribers, Followers and Circles
Twitter is known to have many apps, widgets, tools, apis and desktop apps to easily manage followers, follow people, search for people of your interest to follow, manage multiple accounts easily using desktop apps like Tweetdeck and post updates. Facebook also have many applications but not desktop apps like Twitter. Unlike Twitter Followers, FB Subscribers doesn’t have a apps base yet. Coming to Google+ APIs, Google+ launched its first API for public on September 15th, 2011 and it seems that lots more are going to come up soon.
Analysing the concerns of user for Followers, Following, Subscribers and Circles system
Though these services give options for custom settings for public sharing, but there are certain concerns that need be addressed here. Generally, on all these social networks a user updates about what he is doing, what he has done, what he is upto and share his images etc. Also, he does have the options to control who can see his posts and updates (on some of the networks). But few concerns that a user have in his mind are that what he is updating, how frequently he is updating and for whom these updates are. Addressing these concerns,even after giving options like customized public view access of your updates, you know that every update from you is not meant for your family and friends, on very frequent updations your friends can get annoyed with you, and some updates needs to be just general. For such updates, if you have started updating every minute or every 5 minutes to your wall (using some automatic tools or apps) then definitely your friends gonna get annoyed. So, there should be some mechanism out there where your subscribers can view these updates and your friends doesn’t (only if they want) and also doesn’t get angry with you.
The difference
There is a big difference in how Twitter Followers and Facebook Subscribers work. On Twitter, you can have multiple separate accounts for your personal as well as company or organization use. Where as on Facebook you can only have one account that is, yours (as individual). You cannot create accounts for companies and organizations, but can create pages (very popular and effective) for them. Facebook users can Like them and in a way they are subscribing to these pages. By becoming a Fan of a page they can view all the updates of page.
With Twitter already being there for quite a long time now, Google+ with a recent addition and Facebook being a new entrance, Twitter do have an edge with thousands of apps, widgets and tools powering Twitter Followers and updates. But, with a large developer community of Facebook apps, it won’t be long for Facebook to come up with widgets to be put on webpages, websites and blogs which would say Subscribe Me, I have 200 Subscribers, like Follow Me for Twitter and Add to Circles for Google+.
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