Happy fifth birthday, Google+: It's like you were never here

I tend to look back fondly at the technology that has left a mark on me throughout the years. Memorable trips down memory lane involve things that have been a part of my digital lifestyle for many, many years. Google+ is one of them. As a longtime member, I should be reminiscing now as today the social network turns five. But, for some reason, the only thing that I can think about is knowing from the get go that it would never be the next big thing. It looks like I was onto something.

Google+ is one of the largest social networks, but if you are an active user like me you are probably wondering what all those other members are up to because few of them seem to share new things these days. As time goes by, it feels like Google+ is shrinking to a small crowd of enthusiasts. Few people seem to care about it lately, and I am slowly joining the ranks of those who can't be bothered anymore.

Five years ago I was talking about Google+ with two friends, and they were telling me that it had all the right features that one could want in a social network. Circles was especially interesting at the time as it introduced the idea that people might want to restrict the audience for some things. That was in stark contrast to how Facebook was designed, as everything you posted was set to be shared with all of your friends.

They were also telling me that it was only a matter of time before people would convince their friends to ditch Facebook for Google+. They weren't the only ones who believed that, as the social network seemed to have great potential, all things considered. Even Mark Zuckerberg was probably worried that it could steal Facebook's thunder. But what many people did not count on was people's desire not to complicate their lives with new things.

As Google tried to make Google+ the best social network that one could ask for it did not realize that perhaps people did not want something new. It is always a big risk to go after a powerful player, especially one that people are comfortable with. It is like Google trying to take Apple head on today -- a move that could have made sense five or six years ago, but which today feels like a grave mistake.

The power of a social network comes from the connections that its users have with each other. There's strength in numbers in this case, just like with messaging apps. The higher the number of friends and acquaintances using it the harder it is to convince them to move on to something different. As time went by, it was obvious that the first Google+ fanboys simply could not bring all of their friends over. It was simply not appealing enough to warrant such a big change.

The folks that did create Google+ accounts early on seem to have bailed out. I have lots of friends in my Circles who are also early members, but off the top of my head I can't think of a single one who posts on Google+. They are all happily sharing things on Facebook, just like they were five years ago.

Over the years Google has tried to make Google+ more appealing to people, but its approaches have proven to be either controversial or ineffective. More white space, custom URLs or sneakily being turned into a user without want to be one, have done little to help its case. The only thing that seems to have had an effect is Communities, which make it easy for users with shared interests to connect and share things with each other. It's like Groups on Facebook, only with less engagement.

I typically try to write as much as possible using present tense when talking about things that are relevant at that time, because, well, this is a news site after all. But with Google+, even though it's still alive, I can't help but see it as a product of the past, a mad experiment that led nowhere. To be honest, I can't remember the last time that I wrote about it...

Photo Credit: Lolostock/Shutterstock