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2011 - 2019
Google+
“+1 if you remember.”
- Birth year
- 2011
- Shutdown year
- 2019
- Lifespan
- 8 years
- Peak era
- 2011-2013
- Company
- Category
- Social Networks
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What Was It?
Google+ tried to organize online identity into circles, communities, and +1s, then became a quiet ghost town with passionate pockets.
Circles made audience selection a visible part of sharing. The service also gave communities a place to gather around a subject, so the experience could differ greatly between a quiet general feed and a lively specialist group. Its overall reputation does not capture every pocket of activity.
This memorial concerns the consumer social network. For the people who used its communities regularly, the shutdown meant losing a shared location for conversations and discoveries, not simply removing another unused icon from a collection of Google products.
Things You Probably Forgot
- Circles
- Hangouts integration
- +1 buttons
- Forced YouTube identity changes
- Communities
The Story
- 2011 Launched as Google's major social push.
- 2013 Deeply integrated with YouTube comments.
- 2018 Google announced consumer shutdown.
- 2019 Consumer Google+ closed.
How It Died
Low engagement and security issues ended Google's social network push.
What Replaced It?
Memories
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