That would seem to be true, as thinking otherwise is quite foolish of course. However, the very next paragraph is: "Sure, Google hopes to build a social networ

That would seem to be true, as thinking otherwise is quite foolish of course. However, the very next paragraph is: "Sure, Google hopes to build a social network that competes with Facebook, Twitter and other social services, but that is not the main reason the company has put so many resources behind Google+. Instead, Google+ is a social layer that has always been intended to sit on top of the company’s flagship product: search." What? "Google+ is a social layer that has always been intended to sit on top of the company's flagship product: search" just exactly as long as they decided to "build a social network that competes with Facebook, Twitter and other social services". He is somehow trying to sleight-of-hand away the causal relationship here. If Google+ fails to rival Facebook and Twitter as a social network, it might still turn out ok somehow, but it will doubtlessly be considered a failure internally and externally.