Users are just rediscovering underrated Google feature they're begging to come back
The internet is littered with the corpses of failed social media platforms. MySpace, Friendster and Vine each had their moment in digital history before fading into the past.
Now one of Google's shut-down social platforms is experiencing the exact nostalgia wave, with users only now realising what they lost.
Launched in 2011, Google+ was a social network that was owned and operated by Google until it shut down in 2019.
The platform aimed to challenge dominant social networks while integrating other Google products, such as Google Drive, Blogger and YouTube.
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Despite Google's heavy promotion, the platform failed to win people over. However, the tech giant kept the platform alive until 2018, when a data breach led Google to close the site permanently.
Google+ represented the company's fourth attempt at social networking, following Google Buzz, Google Friend Connect, and Orkut.
Over on Reddit, users are mourning the loss of the social media: "Anyone else remember this đ" alongside the Google+ logo.
"It was so good. But it was ahead of its time and marketed as something that it wasn't. Still miss it," one user replied.
"Almost 7 years since closure," another admitted.
"My first rodeo with social media, was definitely an experience," a third user fondly recalled.
In another thread discussing the platform, another Reddit user claimed: "Facebook was too popular back then, if Google had waited a few more years then things might have turned out different."
What was Google+?
Google+ launched as an invite-only platform in 2011 before opening to the public later that year. In it were many of the features typical of social networks you see on the likes of Facebook and X (formerly Twitter) today like posting photos and status updates.
Where Facebook had 'likes', and X had 'Favourites', Google+ had the branded and (less catchy) 'Plus One' button. However, Google marketed Google+ as more than just another social network, branding it as a 'social layer' that would integrate across all of its services. You might remember its signature features included sorting friends into 'Circles' and making group video calls with 'Hangouts.'
According to Google, millions of people had signed up within weeks of the launch, but unfortunately, few people were actually using it.
"Google+ was destined to fail from day one," said Matt Navarra, a social media consultant.
"Issues with an unwieldy and changeable UI [user interface], being the latecomer versus giants like Facebook, a disjointed user experience, and rumours of internal disagreements about how Google+ would be leveraged" all contributed to its downfall, Navarra added.
Meanwhile, Google+ enforced a strict real-name policy, banning anyone using pseudonyms or screen names and sometimes locking them out of other Google services like Gmail.