[innonate]

Very smart move by Google here. People don't trust Google+ as a repository for photos because it's inherently a social product and with social products there is always some confusion about privacy.

As a standalone product they can focus on making the best product for photos vs fitting photos into a failed social platform.

[gress]

It may be a good move, but calling it 'Very Smart' seems like giving them too much credit given that it's really just returning to what everyone else does after the disaster of Google+

[innonate]

Fair enough. So perhaps not smart, but brave? When you have a lot invested in something like Google+ a smart call can be tough to make.