What's Hot / Explore Stream on Google+

Very many newcomers to Google+ are annoyed that strangers are posting in their streams. That's why in so many "popular" posts the comments are a bit acrimonious.

Why do you get stranger's posts in your stream?

The Explore stream portrays popular posts from users. On this tab you can also find your Google+ saved searches.

The amount and quality of the WH posts depend on your Google+ account language choice. In Finnish for about 90% of time we get an announcement that "This feature is not available in your language yet" but then perhaps once in every two weeks a post will appear in the Finnish language version and all the newcomers are wondering what's going on, why do I get an unknown person's post in my stream...


Do these posts bother you?

The "Hottie" can be muted just like any other circle by sliding the slider to the left (top right hand corner), but who's going to inform the newbies about this?

Quite cold... The U.S. What's Hot nowadays...

Try changing your language from these settings and see what's happening in the different "Explore" sites.
I mainly use G+ in US English.

Unless you're into HDR photography, B&W photography, Google's Pages, News Pages, Google staff, politics (US based), Tumblr-based photography, celebs, hotel pools and treehouses, quotes, Maldives island underwater restaurants, aphorisms, fake email myths and cutesie photography, you won't enjoy the stream very much, some might even accuse it being a bit facebookish.

Often the images have been pinched from a less popular post and reposted without giving any credit to the original poster or source;  Happened with my posts many times, even with my own photographs.  There are several popular profiles which are clearly fake, using a dating service / celebrity profile pic with a follower army of "Blueheads" to share, +1 and comment those posts.

I see that certain Pages get their posts regularly in the stream only after 10 shares and a handful of pluses...
A bit unfair, isn't it?


How long does a post remain in this stream?
Well, there is no rhyme or reason to the duration of any given post that I have noticed. Some hang around for days gathering many thousands of +1:s and reshares, some just make a quick appearance and are taken down after a measly hundred or so interactions.  Mysterious.

It used to be better

To me 'What's Hot' has been ruined, thanks to all the people who were whining about the content, there was a lot of talk in the beginning of 2012 and Google changed the algo.  Last year anyone could get their post lifted to be seen by many thousands of users.  Not so anymore, the focus is different.

The present Hottie content could almost be put in a subscription circle of around 100 people / Pages and it'd be all the same in the end.

I'm wondering how the Google+ related helpful posts from a score of Plussers never find their way into 'What's Hot' anymore...  

That's where the new users would find the advice and get helpful tips, duh!

Russell Deasley's cat

Don't get me wrong, it's not a question of "sour grapes" with me writing about this topic, I've had my posts in the Hottie stream many times. But not always the posts I would have chosen, the ones which would help new users in getting to know Google+ better.

Luckily there are pearls among the chaff, so that even a few excellent and interesting posts get more visibility, especially when scrolling down past the top quotes and puppy images. I guess those cute pics are what the majority wants, otherwise they wouldn't be in the stream, right?

If you are interested in the Hot posts from different countries, check this CircleCount link out: Here is an example of Continental Europe, including Russia.

Are you happy with the WH -stream, or would you change something?