Has there ever been a successful case of bootstrapping a new social media product with an existing userbase? Like not just added features or merging two together.
Google+ was successful from any real metric but it didn’t replace Facebook so it was axed.
Hangouts (now Meet?) was also a product out of Google+ but considering GChat (the xmpp version) existed before, it was kind of a step backwards.
I think Google Local Guide also has some parts of Google+, not sure.
But the community is so minuscule that I'm not sure Google even knew it existed. If it had taken off to the same degree among something closer to critical mass, like today's parasocial celebrity communities or mainstream sports, it might've survived.
IMO most of that TTRPG community migrated to Discord, but the invite requirements make discovery horrible, search is terrible, real-time chat is miserable for discussion, and its "forum" features are just threaded chats. The vibe is way worse, it breeds and feeds drama, and the audience that survives it can correspondingly be either less appealing or require more moderation.
Bluesky doesn't solve the same problems as G+ circles, but between feeds and follow/moderation lists, it has a similar vibe of being able to focus the lens on a topic better than Twitter or Threads, and without the overhead and UX gaps of Fediverse.
Touch of genius really.
I mean that morning when Zuck woke up and decided that a Threads a/c would need an Instagram a/c he must have seen on his daily astronomy calendar "Day of self-sabotage".