It was supposed to be Google's answer to Facebook, but Google+ remained the pale and unpopular shadow of its mammoth competitor. A lot of people had Google Plus profiles but never really spent much time there. Some enjoyed the quiet calm of the platform which they found to be a place for meaningful discussions and getting valuable feedback unlike the busy whirl of Facebook and Twitter. Now the company has announced that Google Plus will down shutters in August 2019.
A security bug in the social platform exposed the private profile data of many users earlier this year. The bug was sorted out in March 2018; however, the company decided to shut down operations. Fans think that this is just an excuse to shut shop.
Some of us will certainly miss this platform. It did have a few things to recommend it. However there just weren’t enough people on it. The kind of interaction that people had come to expect of social media just wasn’t happening here.
Users of this social media platform have a particular affinity for it because of its welcome lack of ads, the ability to write long posts and really connect to people. It was more about meeting new people than about connecting to celebrities or keeping in touch with existing friends.
It’s a fact that most people who enjoyed being on social networks were on Google +, but not really. They had profiles on there, but spent little or no time on it. So while it was kind of lonely there, there was also probably a lot less hate, trolling and viciousness.
Most people aren’t really concerned about the platform announcing its closure in August 2019; quite simply because the network does not have that many users; active users at any rate.
…. But they can’t clearly remember when they did so last. Or why.
Most people seem to think that it’s no skin off their nose that Google Plus is no longer going to be around in about 10 months (by August 2019). Influencers and social media personalities who had followers in the hundreds of thousands would barely manage to cobble together a few hundred or thousand on this platform.
For many, a Google+ profile was a formality. Posting and updating was a chore and not an enjoyable one. Executive and marketing strategies required individuals and business entities to have a Google + profile and so they had it….a matter of going through the motions rather than anything else.
Google is a behemoth with many, many irons in the fire. Google + is a tiny, fairly insignificant part of its bouquet of offerings. It has never been the focus; nor has it kept innovating to constantly give users new features and endless opportunities for self affirmation and ego boosting the way, say, Facebook does.
This is true for most people who are on Google Plus – you know you have a profile, but you kind of forget about it. On hearing about the impending closure of Google+, many are quizzically asking – Oh! Is it still around? I thought it was already gone.
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