I’ve been playing around with Google+ more-or-less since it launched, but I’m not sold on it yet. After a bit of thought, I think it’s because there’s a fundamental disconnect between the kinds of behaviour that it encourages and the kinds of behaviour that it’s actually good at. Or maybe I’m just using it wrong. Either way, I’ll explain my reasoning here.

First, I should describe my frame of reference. I use both Twitter and Facebook, but I like the former much more.

I’m 75% of the way to becoming a dad for the first time. What better way of displaying that progress — for a programmer at least — than as a Mac application? (Not currently available in the App Store.)

I thought for this weeks PhotoFriday theme, simply being “Inside” wasn’t quite enough. It had to show being inside which also implies that there’s an outside visible. So, here I was in Ireland, sat inside the car, waiting for the rain to subside. I thought that that made this a decent entry.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Glowing.” I’m entry number 184.

• Extreme Tidying Up – “He is a Swiss artist and comedian, who may or may not have an OCD problem.”

I’d walked across this square, in the City of London, for weeks before, one evening, I went past at dusk and saw that the pavement was “Glowing,” which, by strange coincidence, is this weeks PhotoFriday theme.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Near.” I’m entry number 164.

• Vintage 80s: Life on the streets – Images from London in the 1980’s.

This is about as “Near” — this weeks PhotoFriday theme — as I really want to get to a crocodile. Or alligator. Which ever this one is. It was in a farm, behind a fence, in Vietnam but still looked like a formidable creature.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Cars.” I’m number 193.

• Is Rick Perry a 21st-century Galileo? – No.
• Jobs Will Follow a Strengthening of the Middle Class – …or why “trickle down” economics — where the rich get tax cuts and everyone else magically benefits — doesn’t work.

• Don Norman: Google doesn’t get people, it sells them – “But in fact the advertisers are the users and you are the product.”
• The Problem With Online Ads – This is why I tend to buy apps I like, even those with free versions. I prefer being a customer to being a target for advertisers.

Cars, this weeks PhotoFriday theme, seem such every-day sights that it’s easy to think that they’re not worth taking pictures of unless it’s something exotic. However, for some reason, I was taking pictures of the local shopping centre, so I have this image of a bunch of cars.

There’s no need to feel guilty for not voting for me in last weeks challenge since I didn’t get the time to post an entry.