I ask myself that same question. Google keeps rolling out services that I have no urge to try. All my needs are satisfied. Seems like they're pissing in the wind.
As I said above, Google is keenly aware of the fact that closed social networks are a blind spot for them. Based on their ~2005 bet on MySpace over Facebook and the continuing-to-decline relationship between FB and Google, they don't have much hope for a partnership.
Social networking makes sense for Google, considering they have almost 100 million email users and many millions more in daily search users. Why not try to get those people to stick around longer? Plus, Google+ isn't a Facebook killer, it's most certainly more aimed at Twitter which, again, makes tons of sense for Google. Instead of creating expensive (and precarious) partnerships with Twitter for their data, why not just take all their users?
Why would I want to kiss my friends goodbye and set up on Google+? I hear it's a pretty lonely ghost town. Which is probably exactly why Google threw out the number of visitors -- to make it sound like a smashing success and thus encourage people to give them a shot.
Google Plus is more of a distribution platform (ala Twitter) than a true one-to-one social network. G+ is currently sharing billions of items, but that sharing has been much more of the broadcast type. All that aside, there are plenty of people who are happy to have some sort of alternative to Facebook.
Also there's no way I'm comfortable giving ONE company all my email, photos, comments, likes, search queries, etc. I really doubt Google execs are virtuous enough to trust.
People have turned their lives over to Facebook despite all their privacy gaffs, no reason to think they'll be hesitant to do so with Google.
That stat was 20 mil visitors, not users. At least that was the wording of the WSJ a couple weeks ago. Are they really claiming that many users?
10 million users 20 days ago. I really doubt their pace has slowed down so much they haven't hit 20 million users yet.
http://www.christianpost.com/news/g...s-facebook-users-ready-to-migrate-poll-52582/
18 million users 10 days ago.