Google+ may be the Fastest to 100,000,000 users, and Why it doesn’t Matter.
Bill Gross, the founder of Idealab whose portfolio includes companies Snap, UberMedia, and Aptera, predicted via Google+ that the fresh-out-the-kitchen social play would be the fastest social network to reach 100,000,000 members. Numbers released by Google during their quarterly earnings call pegged the current membership at about 10,000,000 which is not all that bad for a “limited launch” that happened just over a week ago. Mr. Gross could be correct. In fact, I would say that you will probably see his prediction come true. However, I am not sure that his prediction was quite as bold as he thinks. To me, making the prediction that Google+ will be the fastest to 100,000,000 users is like saying that Amazon/Quidsi’s Wag.com will be the fastest pet superstore website to 1,000,000 orders - it is a complete no-brainer. Google+, like the new Wag.com, has the luxury of being operated by a company that is already at scale. So, while Google+ may be the fastest to 100,000,000, there is something a bit more compelling and fulfilling knowing that Facebook or Twitter managed their current membership completely from scratch, facing the problem of scale all the way up.
