With so much excitement and attention surrounding the launches of both the Google+ project and Google +1 this year, it can be very difficult to know what each of them does, and more importantly, what the key differences between the two of them are.

So for this blog post, I've decided to look at the Google+ project, which is Google's foray into the world of the social network. The Google+ project is, according to the people at the search engine giant, their attempt to make both Google and the notion of online sharing better by making Google more inclusive, more social and above all, allowing the users to connect with whoever they want in a variety of ways.

The Google+ project is home to a number of new features and innovations that are designed to make it much easier for Google+'s members to interact with their friends, relatives and work colleagues online. While this may sound very similar if not identical to what Facebook does for users, but the Google+ project has the Circles feature which allows users to share information like status updates with a selected group of people, so you can let your close friends know what's going on in your life, without everyone else in your feed, such as your parents, knowing.

Other features that the Google+ project boasts are +Sparks, which thanks to a new online search engine, allows users to search for and then create a feed for a specific topic or news story, thus enabling them to connect and share information with other users who have the same interests. Another feature that Google are offering is +Hangouts, which is their new version of an instant chat service, that incorporates the familiar instant chat with a live feed that can include several people at once. There are also a number of ways to use your mobile phone to update your page, such as +Instant Upload, which uploads pictures from your phone as you take them, into a private album but only with your permission, of course. There's also +Huddle, which lets you coordinate all your text messages, to create a group messaging service, which could prove invaluable when trying to arrange a get together or a night out.

Since June, Google+ has been available to all Android users, and for those of us that don't have an Android phone, there is talk of it coming to the App Store at some point in the near future. While Google's anticipated foray into the world of the social network is focused on getting people to communicate better and in a more sociable way online, is it really just another version of Facebook? And will it be able to replicate or even beat the success of Mark Zuckerberg's cult site. Or will it struggle in a market that has been dominated by the aforementioned Facebook? While it's very early days, only time will tell whether Google+ will go the way of Bebo or MySpace, but Google+ represents part of Google's ongoing mission to make sharing information and connecting with people more fun, easy and above all less-awkward, which needs to be congratulated.