[ivanbrussik]

These claims that people make about Google+ are ridiculous. Sure, if you count account sign-ups then they are probably #1 but active users...no way.

"Google+’s user numbers are juiced simply because Google forces the product on everyone, and if you use Google to authenticate yourself to third parties, you are using Google+"

I feel the same way, I know a lot of people online that use Google+, but zero of my IRL friends use Google+ (most use FB, Instagram and Twitter).

[bad_user]

You're confusing the cause and the effect. Google± is not being juiced up with integrations to make G+ popular, but rather those integrations are the reason for why G+ was created in the first place.

Google simply wanted a universal Google account for YouTube, Google Play, Blogger and so on. As to for why the wanted that? Well, Facebook is proving that there is value in collecting people's likes and comments, and then using those for serving ads.

On the active G+ users remark, I disagree. Every YouTube user is now a G+ user. Every GPlay user that wants to write reviews is now a G+ user.

So the point that their growth is not organic is rather moot.

[dingaling]

> Every YouTube user is now a G+ user.

This statement surprises me. Casual video-viewing is a large proportion of YouTube's attraction and does not require authentication ( except for age-restricted content ).

I don't have any Google accounts and I don't have any problems viewing YouTube content.

Every Youtube uploader might be a G+ user, but what proportion of the audience is that? 10% at most?

[bad_user]

I go to YouTube all the time to listen to music. Organizing playlists on YouTube requires an account (playlists which are public by default, something that really annoys me). Liking a video on YouTube requires an account. You really underestimate the number of active YouTube accounts. And even if 10% is a good estimate, given that YouTube is the de facto destination for videos, 10% is huge.

And btw, Facebook is a competitor because a great deal of YouTube traffic comes from Facebook and so many people end up liking or commenting around YouTube links on Facebook. And that's what Google is trying to prevent with Google+: lost traffic, lost opportunities.

Note, I'm not saying that what Google is doing is good for us. After all, the Internet's strength is in its decentralized aspect. All I'm saying is that, from Google's point of view, Google+ already is a success. People miss the point when they view Google+ as a failure. Larry Page once said that Google+ is now the new Google. And he wasn't joking about it.

People laughed at Android when it came out. Nobody's laughing now. I fear a Google dominated near future, which is why in the Google versus Facebook battle I actually hope Facebook wins, but I admire Google's execution.