Social Options

    I've been trying to define the differences between Facebook and Google+ for a few months now, and I think it comes down to control. 
    On Google+, I have transparent and almost complete control over my stream. I can circle someone, or uncircle them if I'm not interested in what they have say. I can even block them if they keep sharing things I don't care about.
    On Facebook, I can 'like' and 'unlike', but Facebook wants to control my stream. They decide which are the top stories, or whether that post from a friend is important enough to show me. They have added controls to enable me to change the level of importance I want to see from each person or page, but they still decide the importance of each post.
    Sure, people can and do block me on Google+, but that is still about putting control into the hands of the users. Maybe that's a subtle difference, but for me, it's all the difference required to put Facebook in second or third place.