It’s finally here, folks! I’veranted about it. I’vedrummed up enough conversationover it. And Senior Vice President of Engineering, Vic Gundotra, has at long lastannouncedit to be here — it is the clickable hashtag, a feature that allows hash tagged keywords on Google+ to directly link to search results around that topic. The newly clickable hashtags should also work in every keyboard language. Yonatan Zunger, Chief Architect at Google+, states the following....

In the early days of the Google+ beta project, plenty of users were excited to see how cleanly images could be shared across their streams. Some of the more popular G+ users (according to how many people have actually circled them, anyway) have actually used animated imagery on the platform to draw attention to more thought-provoking posts. Myspace Founder Tom Anderson, for example, hasdefinitely been known to share a few posts containing animated GIFs, while other users (the formerly skeptical Robert Scoble included)adopted the trend shortly afterward....

In case you hadn’t noticed by now, demand for access to Google+ isastronomicright now, and when demand for something is exceed supply, the scammers and others looking to make a quick buck will undoubtedly come out to play. There’s no difference here. Access to Google+ is currentlyon sale on eBayfor prices ranging between$0.99 and $27 by a number of sellers claiming to offer ‘instant delivery’. That a market has emerged for access to the new social service isn’t surprising, but given that the rate at which people are being let into the service is being controlled by Google, the chance that you’ll actually get the ‘immediate access’ the eBay sellers are promising is slim....

The all-conquering, indestructible Facebook was brought down a peg or two last week when Google finally produced the goods and unleashed an almighty sucker-punch that may well end Facebook’s reign at the top of the social tree. Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock these past ten days, you will of course know that I’m talking aboutGoogle+. Given that it’s currently in private beta mode, you may not have used it yet....

In a recentWiredinterview, Bradley Horowitz, Google’s VP of products, revealed that the Google+ team will focus on the longterm success of the budding platform rather than the flash and buzz encircling it now. Horowitz states that the positive response from consumers and beta-testers alike has definitely been welcome, but that keeping an eye on so much supercharged feedback would blind Google from the real issues on the platform. With this in mind, Horowitz states that Google has been encouraging its team to “stay focused on the long term” rather than keeping an ear to the ground on hype surrounding Google+ (though he admits it’s been difficult to ignore)....