If you can get games in machine readable format, it may be possible to develop a ML approach that figures out the most likely identifications based on relative positions and as much information as image processing provides.
Entrenched giant will most likely attempt to buy agile upstarts (assuming they get some adopters) by enticing them with the vision of bringing their technology to hundreds of thousands of designers. And a few million. Of course, the vision will be muddied by corporate swamps (Yahoo buying Flickr)
There is plenty of room for polishing the default UI. But...
1) Google+ != Twitter. They are competing with Twitter, but that is an argument against making a Twitter clone, not for.
2) A tiny number of users would use those configuration options. Adding options that will benefit a minuscule number of power users and confuse everyone else is not a useful way for the G+ team to spend their time.
This false argument gets repeated over and over. You dont have to bombard everybody with a zillion of probably unneeded options. Separate the everyday from power user options. The poweruser stuff doesnt even have to be obvious, it is sufficient to make it possible. Theres no need to make setting a option outright impossible, if you only goal is to prevent confusing users who will never find it in the first place.
I see your points, and I'm definitely not suggesting G+ should be a Twitter clone, but at the moment I'm seeing that the whole concept of 'following' peoples posts, whether you know them or not, is being used (and encouraged by G+) so I think it needs some improvement.
In regards to the configuration options, I'd suggest that perhaps the defaults should be changed.
Blog engines are a subset of CMSs. They're supposed to be restrictive - that simplicity is part of their value. If they wanted a CMS that would allow them to add their own types of content, they should have gone with a CMS that was more "framework" than "application"
That's what I was thinking, especially when I read this part:
"The CMS has to be everything to everybody. Wordpress has to optimize for both the cat-picture faithful and the ring-bejewled, hair-fisted mogul. Moveable Type has to work whether you are running a lad mag or poetry journal. This is an impossible proposition."
Expecting every (?) CMS to be the end-all solution to every possible content situation is ridiculous. It would be nice/neat but that doesn't seem to be quite how it works—is that idea akin to expecting every vehicle to be able to perform every type of situation available? Expecting your family sedan to also be the workhorse carrying materials and whatnot?
What if you only wanted to ride a simple bicycle down the street and not have to worry about a more intricate/heavy one? I use different CMS for different things though admittedly, that makes it harder to master one in particular.
I do feel as if CMS have kind of stagnated for a bit and am a little tired of most so I'm thankful for the author bringing Netsta to my attention—it looks interesting.
I've wished for change overviews like this. Paypal policy changes in particular - when they send an email simply to say that their 10 page policy document has changed, that isn't helpful.
The EFF diffs some, e.g. http://www.tosback.org/diff.php?vid=1736. That one actually suggests an improvement: You have to strain your eyes to find the difference. In other pairs, the differences stand out better.
