14 DAY TRIAL // Well, it looks like Google is giving up, waving the white flag and surrendering its weapons at the feet of the Internet community that wants to be anonymous even on Google+.
The company has announced that it has lifted the restrictions on what name you can use on your Google+ profile. Up until now, ever since Google+ was introduced, these limitations have helped create a community made up of real people, the company said, but it also excluded a bunch of people who wanted to be a part of it without using their real names.
“Over the years, as Google+ grew and its community became established, we steadily opened up this policy, from allowing +Page owners to use any name of their choosing to letting YouTube users bring their usernames into Google+. Today, we are taking the last step: there are no more restrictions on what name you can use,” the company announced.
Google writes that it has been aware of the desire for this change for a while and it’s taking some of the blame for the situation it is in. “We know that our names policy has been unclear, and this has led us to some unnecessarily difficult experiences for some of our users. For this we apologize, and we hope that today’s change is a step toward making Google+ the welcoming and inclusive place that we want it to be.”
The company’s policy has been criticized since it was introduced and accounts that didn’t pass its real-name test were deleted along the years. Even Internet mogul Kim Dotcom went through some troubles with the platform since his name wasn’t “real” enough for Google, although it is a bit understandable.
The main concern about the change of heart Google is having is that trolls will now flood the platform, but the company doesn’t seem to be too concerned about it, mainly because it believes its “troll-smashing department” has gotten very good at its job, as Yonatan Zunger, chief architect of Google+, put it.
Changing your username alters the way one appears on other Google products too, including Gmail or YouTube, with the latter being the center of a pretty tough wave of criticism following the recent introduction. More specifically, the rule that impacted YouTube where Google integrated Google+ into the comments section, making it mandatory for users to connect their YouTube account to their Google+ page in order to comment, and thus, exposing their true identities to the world.