As I was gearing up for Halloween, I got my first and only trick of the evening, and it was a nasty one. The new and "improved" Google Reader arrived. And, as expected, it sucks. Functionality has been lost, and not replaced on the Google Plus side. The official Reader blog says +1 now replaces the 'Share' and 'Share with Note' functionality. Really? Exactly how does it replace those? If I do +1 it, it certainly does not show up in my Plus stream as the full item, which it did in Reader. And speaking of sharing in Reader, what replaces the 'Note in Reader' bookmarklet? Nothing.
I have to assume not many folks used Reader the way my friends and I did, and I can imagine that Reader was difficult to monetize. But I enjoyed commenting on my friends' shared items, and likewise enjoyed reading their comments on mine. it was a nice, simple way to share almost anything on the web. As my favorite "Occupy Google Reader" protestor so aptly put it, "If I wanted Facebook I'd use it." Hopefully a Reader replacement is coming soon.
