Rumor: Google Planning to Stop Forcing Google+ Integration

[Cognimancer]

Rumor: Google Planning to Stop Forcing Google+ Integration

Google+ may be on its deathbed following the departure of the service's head honcho.

Vic Gundotra, Google senior VP and head of Google+, recently departed the company with little explanation. While official details have yet to surface, TechCrunch reports that [http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/24/google-is-walking-dead/] Gundotra's departure heralds a turning point for Google+ and how the social network ties in with Google's other services. And not in a small way - this may be the end of Google's aggressive efforts to make everyone use their social network.

Google+ has never been the most well-received of Google's services, especially after its mandatory integration with YouTube and other Google-operated services. If TechCrunch's anonymous sources are to be believed, G+ will soon be uncoupled from many of those operations as the social network undergoes some massive downscaling. In fact, it may no longer be much of a social network; TechCrunch reports that G+ won't be competing with Facebook and Twitter anymore.

The sources also indicate that some 1,000-1,200 employees who were working on Google+ will be reshuffled to other projects within Google, primarily Android. All this information, however, is pretty dubious. Google has issued a statement that Gundotra's departure will have "no impact on our Google+ strategy." TechCrunch seems to have faith in its "multiple sources," but there's been no verifiable confirmation on the intel.

We'll update you if anything substantial comes up.

Source: Ars Technica [http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/24/google-is-walking-dead/]

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[RJ Dalton]

And there was much preemptive rejoicing.

I myself will wait for an update saying this is for sure before I get too excited.

 

[FalloutJack]

No no, please keep wasting your time, money, and resources! It'll make such a new generation of jokes, memes, and anecdotes. (Not to say it won't already, but hey! The humor must flow!)

 

[Something Amyss]

And there was much preemptive rejoicing.

I myself will wait for an update saying this is for sure before I get too excited.

Considering it was largely debunked before The Escapist even reported it, I would definitely hold off.

 

[Reincarnatedwolfgod]

Well I hope this rumor is true but I would more willing to bet it's false.
there exist the rare occasion when I want to make a comment on youtube and that moment I usually have something positive to say.

the principal of refusing to be forced to use google+ for a feature that should work with out it is worth more to me then my ability to comment in youtube. that is not saying much for youtube comments.

 

[Charli]

Not flippin likely.

Sorry Escapist crew I take all rumours with a pinch of salt as ever, but someone is probably having you on here.

Or someone at Google got really drunk and someone mistook what they said and told a mouthy relative.

 

[SKBPinkie]

I never cared much for G+ for the most part. It was decent - hangouts are fine, and the messaging app on android is good.

However, they royally fucked up the YouTube comment system. So even if this is true, I'd like it if YT was the only thing they changed back to normal. Everything else is pretty good.

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

I hear it's unlikely to die, I for one like using G+, back in 2011 I was invited to join when it first started off by a friend and made plenty in the process.

I love it because it felt like something different from Facebook it felt more alive and different, sure the integration later on was annoying but hey I joined G+ and didn't mind it so then I got the added benefit of being on YT and G+ at the same time instead of requiring two different accounts and passwords which did become annoying (umn Origin,Steam,Uplay accounts anyone?).

Hearing people rejoice to thinking it;s dying clearly never liked the service, didn't bother to look elsewhere.

Though if it dies, it;s not the end of the world, I'll most likely hop to a better SCN in time that isn't FB because I don't like what FB has become at all, it's just a putrid mess of ugly compared to what G+ currently offers.

With that said this new shuffle isn't going to spell doom and gloom for G+, I still see Google using it for the future, to kill it off entirely within a very short time would piss off a hell of a lot of people, Google shouldn't want to do that and neither should anyone else.

PS, if you're going to parade it's apparent death then that by all means gives me free rights to do the same for something you've loved in return, wanna treat me like that and I'll do the same in return.

 

[epicdwarf]

Hopefully this turns out to be true! I still remember people claiming that Facebook was the new myspace because of Google plus. Google plus just got in the way of everything. Now all Google needs to do is to start fixing youtube.

 

[CriticalMiss]

If it means I don't get pestered all the time to use Google+ then good riddance, but it seems unlikely that it will ever go away until Google buy out a better service and start forcing that on people.

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

Hearing people rejoice to thinking it;s dying clearly never liked the service, didn't bother to look elsewhere.

There really is no elsewhere that's even close to the equivalent of YouTube. I was perfectly happy to let Google+ rot in a corner of my total apathy until they shoved it down my throat.

PS, if you're going to parade it's apparent death then that by all means gives me free rights to do the same for something you've loved in return, wanna treat me like that and I'll do the same in return.

Nobody ever implied anything different...

OT:
I don't even care if this is a largely unreliable rumor. I'm going to get excited and no one can stop me.

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

one can only hope

 

[Avaholic03]

So, when I canceled my Google+ and told them the reason that I did so was because of all the forced integration....they may have actually listed to me? Sweet. I never figured those cancellation surveys actually got read.

 

[oldtaku]

Yes! Die! Die! Die! I dance on your grave!

But... seems a little unlikely they'd remove it for YouTube. It's already on there like a festering canker, having done nothing to improve on the previous comment system, which was a cankering fester. They'd actually have to do some work to defang the forced real name and create a G+ profile crap. But the YouTube team does still have a lot of people on it.

Also, I hope the G+ photo stuff goes on - that's quite good. It was only when they started being dicks about it and forcing it down everyone's throat for other services that they went completely off the rails and everyone started actively despising it.

 

[oldtaku]

So, when I canceled my Google+ and told them the reason that I did so was because of all the forced integration....they may have actually listed to me? Sweet. I never figured those cancellation surveys actually got read.

I'd like to think that too, but Google really doesn't give a damn about users or customer service. I think it more likely they looked at their active members trend vs how many hundreds of millions of dollars they've spent on it and decided to pull the plug.

 

[Omnicrom]

I'd like to think that too, but Google really doesn't give a damn about users or customer service. I think it more likely they looked at their active members trend vs how many hundreds of millions of dollars they've spent on it and decided to pull the plug.

If they really are going to finally ditch the hideousness of Google+ and actually allow me to comment on the obscure stuff I like to comment on, then I think you've got it right. If Google+ is being decoupled it's because it was unprofitable, if it was making mucho buckeroos and people felt exactly the same as they do now Google would happily keep foisting it around.

But god, I really hope it's true.

 

[Nowhere Man]

They should just put Google+ and fucking up Youtube on the back burner for now and focus on somehow getting Google fiber to the rest of the country - and stat.

 

[Kaymish]

if its true finally i hate g+ its so damn anoying especially how i somehow ended up with a bunch of youtube accounts all with the same name under the same account and all but one of them totally useless

 

[Bindal]

PS, if you're going to parade it's apparent death then that by all means gives me free rights to do the same for something you've loved in return, wanna treat me like that and I'll do the same in return.

Sure, if you FIND something that was not related to something YOU used but then was forced upon you to be used for no reason and didn't want to use.
Because I used to comment on YT-Videos. But then I was forced to use Google Plus to do that and I had no desire to Google Plus in any way (same for Facebook, by the way).

That's why most people cheer if it dies - because it finally leaves the stuff it had no reason to be a REQUIREMENT in. If it will stay "an alternative to Facebook" after that and nothing else, that's totally fine by me. Just don't force me to use it for something it has no relation to.

 

[Frezzato]

Part of me hopes that my extremely rude departure survey regarding why I opted out of Google Plus contributed to this purported demise.