Google’s winding down of its mostly unused and unloved social networking platform Google+ took a new step Monday with the company announcing it would stop forcing users to use a Google+ account with Google products, with the first disentanglement being delivered to its YouTube video service.

The choice of YouTube being the first Google-owned service to be removed from the clutches of Google+ isn’t a coincidence, as it was YouTube users who protested the loudest when forced Google+ integration was thrust upon them back in 2013, a move that removed the ability for users to participate in the site in an anonymous way.

“People have told us that accessing all of their Google stuff with one account makes life a whole lot easier” Google Vice President of Streams, Photos, and Sharing Bradley Horowitz said in a blog post, before adding “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.”

No solid timeframe was given as to when the requirement to have a Google+ account to use other services was given, with the company saying only that the disentanglement would occur over the “coming months.”

With the changes, Google users will only require a Google Account to share content, communicate with contacts, create a YouTube channel and use other features from other Google services.

The better news for those who hated Google+ because it publicly displayed many of their interactions across various Google properties is that Google added that for people who have already created Google+ profiles but don’t plan to use Google+ itself, Google will be offering “better options for managing and removing those public profiles.”

The spin starts here

You’ve got to give it to Google in the way it loves to spin certain stories, and in this case its spinning retreat and possible defeat for Google+ as a positive step forward, or in this case delivering “a more focused experience for Google+.”

If the spin isn’t clear, they’re trying to spin the disentanglement and strategic failure of Google+ as a realignment to make Google+ a better experience for those who use Google+

You can only think that Google’s PR Department really needs to stop passing the bong around and consider that its users aren’t stupid minions who can’t read through the bullshit.

That aside, the move to abandon forced Google+ integration across Google’s range of products will be welcome by the many Google users who hated it in the first place.

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