Where did Marco go on Google+?

If anyone’s wondering why they can’t find me on Google+ anymore, it’s because recent changes led to my YouTube account no longer functioning as I wanted it to.

What was the problem?

Essentially, my situation was like this:

• I have an ancient YouTube account associated with my only gmail address
• Until recently, this YouTube account was not associated with Google+
• A while back, I created a Google+ account for the same gmail address
• Until recently, this Google+ account was not associated with YouTube

Several months ago, Google started asking me whether I wouldn’t rather just merge all of my online identities, but since I hardly use Google+ and because I didn’t feel like trawling through preferences to make sure my YouTube history wasn’t suddenly posted to all circles, I turned them down. I thought it better to keep a wall between the two because, in my mind, there was no association.

Eventually, Google stopped harassing me about it.

I recently discovered that my YouTube page had sprouted its own stunted Google+ page and that my Google+ page had acquired its own YouTube page.

I now had two YouTube accounts and two Google+ pages associated with the same email address. And the default account for that address was the primary Google+ account, which actually has Google+ content but which is associated with an empty YouTube account.

This is what would lead to an issue for me. When I logged in to YouTube, it would ask me as which user I wanted to use YouTube. I could then choose the correct account. In some places–the NetNewsWire browser, for example—the default would switch and all videos I added to my queue would end up in the (now nearly) empty YouTube account.

How to solve a problem like Google+

Is there a way to merge two YouTube accounts? Nope. How about two Google+ accounts? Nope. Can you change association for accounts? You know, so the useless Google+ account could be associated with the useless YouTube account, leaving me alone forever? Nope.

Fine. Then I’ll choose the lesser of two evils and delete the Google+ page (and hopefully it’s associated stunted wart of a YouTube page that’s getting on my last nerve).

Here is the content of the feedback message I wrote to Google when asked why I was deleting my account.

“I’m leaving because recent changes have led to two Google+ pages/accounts linked to the same email. Each of these has it’s own YouTube page.”

• My actual Google+ page, not used very much, had it’s own YouTube page
• My actual YouTube page, used heavily, sprouted its own Google+ page
• The new YouTube page kept ending up as the default one instead of my heavily used one
• My YouTube experience went downhill as I ended up with all of my “Watch Later” videos in a random account (but usually the wrong one).
• I searched, but found no useful assistance
• So I deleted my Google+ page (the lesser of two evils) in the hopes that it would take the undesired YouTube page with it

Post-mortem

Did this work as expected? I honestly don’t know. Time will tell, I suppose. I can still see the page I supposedly deleted, though, which is not promising.

Was there a better way of going about this? Very possibly. But I was utterly unwilling to waste any more time than I already had on the Byzantine array of options. There are a ton of forum posts out there covering myriad similar issues and requests.

All I know is that all I really care about at Google is my Gmail account (untouched) and my YouTube account (also untouched). As long as Google+ stayed out of my way, I was willing to tolerate it, but now that’s it’s impacted my YouTube experience, I didn’t have to think twice before running my sword through it.

Default YouTube Account

It looks like my gambit didn’t work entirely. The Google+ account is gone. That is as expected. The YouTube account that was associated with it is still with me. That wart has no videos, no subscriptions, no playlists and no history and yet it still asserts primacy over my real account. And there is no way to tell YouTube to just stop using that account forever.

I found a setting that lets me tell YouTube which account to use when legacy software can only handle a single account. That’s already an improvement that might address my problems with NetNewsWire.

YouTube advanced settings

If I keep the box checked, then YouTube won’t show me the “Use YouTube as…” selector whenever I browse to the site. (Shown below.)

Account selector

Unfortunately, the option to stop showing the selector is not available from what I consider to be my main YouTube account. So YouTube allows me a choice as to which account to use by default for older applications but no control over which account to use by default for YouTube itself. That is, you can tell YouTube to use a default without asking, but you can’t tell it which default to use. Lovely.

Another Zombie Page

What I consider to by my main YouTube account still has a vestigial Google+ page attached to it. Maybe if I deleted that page, then my account would start behaving normally again?

All the way at the bottom of the “Settings” page, there is a little link, highlighted in the screenshot below.

Delete page? Yes please.

My joy, however, was short-lived, as shown in the follow-up screenshot below.

What a surprise

Google kept the glowing embers of my hope alive by offering me options for remedying the issue. “Disconnect” sounded like exactly what the doctor ordered.

Click.

Where the hell is disconnect?

Incredible. No setting for disconnect. Google is Lucy.[1] toying with me at this point, balancing the football on one end and smirking as I career across the field, intent on driving it through the goalposts. There would be no joy in Mudville this day.[2]

Desperate and ignoring all experience, I clicked on “delete” because, well, fuck it, right?

It's not here either

What if I actually hit “delete channel” above? That’s also not immediately dangerous. I was asked to reauthenticate and was presented with the following very clear and nicely formatted dialog.

Definitely not what I want. At all.

On a positive note, Google didn’t actually delete anything without asking, so I’m still in full possession of my YouTube account. It’s just that it’s attached to a useless Google+ and another YouTube account.

Did I end up getting what I want? Kind of. I think that the other accounts will probably stay in the background now. Was it necessary to delete my Google+ account in order to get where I am now? In hindsight, no. Would I recommend this course of action to others? No.

But I regret nothing.