Google can’t have everything, including a popular search engine. In a move that appears to admit that few people use Google+, the Internet search giant announced today that you no longer need a G+ account to use its services.
In a blog post, Google said that you no longer need to set up a public G+ profile to use all of Google’s services. Instead, you will just need to have a Google Account, which will also allow you to use YouTube.
“People have told us that accessing all of their Google stuff with one account makes life a whole lot easier. But we’ve also heard that it doesn’t make sense for your Google+ profile to be your identity in all the other Google products you use,” Bradley Horowitz, Google VP of Streams, Photos and Sharing, wrote.
The changes will first be visible at YouTube. You will finally be allowed to make comments on YouTube that don’t appear on your G+ account and vice versa. Soon, you won’t even need a G+ account to create a YouTube channel. Once that change is in place, you can even get rid of your G+ account completely.
Even though it certainly looks like G+ is dead, today’s news doesn’t quite kill it. Horowitz did write that they are still looking to add some features, including Google+ Collections, which is sort of like Facebook’s “Top News” option on the news feed. It will make sure G+ posts that you are interested in will show up first. Also, Google is trying to streamline the G+ experience, so some features are also being dropped or moved out of G+. This includes Google+ Photos, which is now part of the Google Photos app. Hangouts will also be moved out soon.
“We think changes like these will lead to a more focused, more useful, more engaging Google+,” Horowitz wrote.
image via Google