People don't seem to understand that Google+ was used internally before launch as though it were Facebook; people only shared with their friends and family. But when the product was launched to the public, it was given a limited release, biasing it to the tech crowd, and they gave the ability to give posts "public" visibility. Well these two things quickly turned Google+ into Twitter rather than Facebook.
Then they spent the next few years trying to fix the disaster they had caused. It would have been a great product if they thought through the launch. But they didn't.
I was just thinking this. Google+ is much more like twitter, where you can follow people to see what they're saying, and there's not necessarily a reciprocal relationship. I also post publicly to Google+, like Twitter, and unlike Facebook where everything I post is private (and generally aimed towards family and RL friends).
I think Google+ in general is totally fine. In general it's better than Facebook or Twitter.... I'm not sure why so many people seem to dislike it. The integration with other Google products doesn't bother me at all. I don't comment on youtube pretty much ever, and I don't mind the auto-cross posting when I post to my blogger blog.
I really wish they had just rolled with it and allowed it to grow as a new Twitter-like product. It still is from what I can see. The majority of people I follow are people I don't know outside of G+ who share publicly or to interest-based circles.
The thing with it being a public social network is that many people want anonymity.
It's clear that from the start they wanted this platform to also serve the basis of an identity service for the rest of google, so the public aspect completely screwed them over.
Then they spent the next few years trying to fix the disaster they had caused. It would have been a great product if they thought through the launch. But they didn't.