It was shoddily implemented though. IIRC even the academic that had the circle idea ranted about how badly plus had implemented it.
On one hand, I would rather have somebody else than Google handling the next social network, on the other, plus had some great idea and shined for a time in some areas like photography.
I used to frequent it a couple of times a week several years ago.
Nowadays, each time I open it by mistake I am taken aback by how extremist lunatics are everywhere in my feed (ymmv)
Nowadays, people manually emulate circles using multiple accounts--a rinsta [0] for the curated public circle, and a finsta [1] for close friends to post personal experiences and funny photos. Some people I know have multiple finstas with varying levels of specificity.
In this context, the "real insta" account is the curated one to build a personal brand; only highly-filtered/vetted content gets posted there. Due to all the time put into curating it, the account is intended to persist forever.
The posts to the "fake insta" has less of a filter, and the account will be dropped/rotated as soon as it gets too much baggage or some content goes negatively viral. Someone bothering the user on their "fake insta"? But the user can't/won't block them for social/cultural reasons? Just stop using that account and create a brand new one, and then only tell your close friends about the new one. Everyone else is still following the old "fake" one which you no longer use hence its fake-ness.
It feels backwards to me too now that you mention it. The logic is that rinsta is the "official" account, and generally the first one that people create and follow, so it's their main.
You can conceptualize it as having a main and an alt--you'd never call your alt your real account.
