Bradley Horowitz has a fairly lengthy blog post up this morning detailing various updates and improvements to the Google+ platform and according to him, these aren’t just “bells and whistles” but “really deep improvements.”
These new features will be rolling out over the course of the next few days. This looks to be the culmination of Google’s #seasonforshipping, which was promoted by Google employees across Google+ as a period of important new upgrades and added features.
Horowitz had this to say in a Google+ post Monday morning:
I’m really thrilled to announce new features and functionality, all of which will be rolling out in the next day or so… These aren’t bells-and-whistles, but really deep improvements that I’m sure you are going to love.
The team knocked it out of the park… Huge congrats and thanks to the many folks who really gave of themselves to make this pre-holiday mega-launch possible. (I hope they find a moment to recharge during the holidays, because we have some awesome stuff planned for 2012!)
Enjoy, and as usual, tell us what you think so that we can learn, improve and adapt accordingly.
The first new feature is probably a long time coming for many users – a noise filter. Google will soon allow users to customize the volume of posts they see in their main Google+ streams from each contact – with a simple slider at the top of people’s specific pages. This way, in theory, heavy posters won’t be able to drown out everyone else on your stream.
After just recently introducing Google+ pages for businesses, Google has looked at all of the feedback and made some adjustments based on the top complaints and requests. One huge new thing that will be rolling out soon is the ability to add 50 different users as administrators to the pages.
There will also be a new notification system for admins as well as a very basic little page stat counter that allows admins to see page interaction – by way of +1’s and circle adds.
Another year-end improvement coming to Google+ involves photos:
Viewing a photo in Lightbox has been completely redesigned with improved navigation, enhanced comment legibility and better overall utility. This design makes the photo the hero, letting the content itself shine through. And we’re introducing a completely new photo-tagging experience that’s both fun and fluid, and lets you quickly focus on the people in your photos.
Google will also roll out improved notifications for everyone with instant “sneak previews” and functionality that allows you to see all the +1s and shares that your posts receive.
Last week, Google+ made small improvements like allowing search results to be filtered by location.
Do you think it will be a good new year for Google+? Let us know in the comments.