There are likely many motives, with some being opportunistic. My read is that a lion share of the discourse is rooted in Google attempting to redefine its relat

There are likely many motives, with some being opportunistic. My read is that a lion share of the discourse is rooted in Google attempting to redefine its relationship with users (unified id), when users are happy with the status quo. YouTube is what brought it out of the shadows. Google can justify the move as being good for users, but I strongly suspect that, in most cases, this agenda is not supportive of the value proposition that the individual properties offer its users. I suspect that Google knows this, but their goals are not consistent with that of most of these users. In other words, Google is willing to take a hit from angry users in exchange for building a unified user network.