| 1 | Google executive Brad Horowitz announced a "pivot" away from Google + as a social network on July 27, 2015. |
| 2 | Google put the final nail in the coffin of its ambition to make Google+ a real competitor to Facebook , Twitter and other leading social networks. |
| 3 | Brad Horowitz, who took the reins of Google+ earlier this year , said Monday that users will no longer need a Google+ account to engage with others on Google products. |
| 4 | Instead, any Google email or account will do. |
| 5 | Google launched Google+ four years ago, seeking to create a big social network with a billion or more people updating their status, posting photos and keeping in touch with friends, family and colleagues. |
| 6 | The company wanted it to be a "platform layer" that unified Google's sharing models, as well as a product and a mobile app, Horowitz explained in a (yes, you guessed it) Google+ update. |
| 7 | "This was a well-intentioned goal, but as realized it led to some product experiences that users sometimes found confusing," he wrote. |
| 8 | Among the most confusing - and irritating - was a requirement that a user have a Google+ account and profile to log into many other Google services. |
| 9 | The most notable rant came in late 2013 when Google imposed this requirement on YouTube viewers, who had been posting comments on the video site for years before Google+ was even a glimmer in Larry Page's eye. |
| 10 | "Why the f- do I need a google+ account to comment on a video," YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim wrote on his YouTube page. |
| 11 | Fittingly, YouTube is one of the first places where Google is yanking this requirement, according to a Google blog. |
| 12 | YouTube told users that they won't need a Google+ account to upload videos, create channels or to comment. |
| 13 | "They thought they could muscle their way to becoming the next big social network," said Aaron Goldman, chief marketing officer of 4C Insights, a social-media data firm. |
| 14 | "They are finally figuring out what this is." |
| 15 | Former Google+ head Vic Gundotra said in late 2013 that Google+ had 300 million monthly active users, although exactly how active these people were was always questioned. |
| 16 | At the time, Facebook had over one billion monthly actives and it has more than 1.4 billion now. |
| 17 | Horowitz said Google+ will focus on connecting users around specific interests. |
| 18 | His said his team is now called SPS, which stands for Streams, Photos and Sharing. |
| 19 | For example, Google Photos, a photo- and video-storage service launched earlier this year, lets users share however they'd like - without a Google+ profile. |
| 20 | Other things people often share on social networks, like their location, are being moved to other Google apps like the messaging and video-chat service Hangouts, Google said. |
| 21 | "In the coming months, a Google Account will be all you'll need to share content, communicate with contacts, create a YouTube channel and more, all across Google," the company said. |