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Developers and Google-Plus
By Dave Winer on Tuesday, July 05, 2011 at 9:53 AM.

Saw a note from Ross Mayfield on Twitter about a Google-Plus vanity URL shortener, gplus.to. He says it will go viral because it fills a gap. I thought the same thing when I looked at it. #

Usernames on Google-Plus are long strings of numbers. Obviously names should be mnemonic and memorable. Bravo for the entrepreneurial spirit for fixing this so quickly. #

A picture named wwgd.gifSo -- what will Google do? (To paraphrase the title of Jeff Jarvis's book.) They are active acquirers. Maybe they'll buy these guys? Viewed from the developer's perspective, do they expect Google to buy them? Could be a marriage made in heaven. #

Or, perhaps Google will re-invent? After all they must have thought of ways to give users short memorable names? It's not that hard a technical problem, evidenced by the speed at which gplus.to showed up (less than a week after launch). #

If they bought them how much should they pay? And how will Google employees feel about a developer getting rich from what they will surely see as a few days' worth of work, when most of them aren't likely to get rich for working much harder for much longer. #

These are the usual face-offs between developers and corporate platforms. #

It'll be interesting to see how Google deals with these questions. #

Also if you're aware of any instant add-ons to Google-Plus, please post a link in the comments, below.  #




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