After nearly eight years of being a Google+ user, the time to say goodbye to the social network is almost here. For those of you that never saw the value of Google+, I  don't expect you to fully understand what hardcore users (I'm one of them) will be missing when the platform is no more. I think Mike Elgan's article probably describes Google+ best when he explains it as a place "where smart people gather for long, detailed and interesting conversations" without the streams being "algorithmically filtered" like most social networks. For me personally, I was able to meet a lot of people on Google+ that I wouldn't have known otherwise on "hit and run" sites like Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

At this point and time, many of the Google+ refugees are scattering and fleeing to any number of social networks (many I never heard of until recently). Instead of following these former Google+  users to their social network of choice, I've decided to follow them via Twitter and their blogs. I've spent the past couple weeks looking up the profiles of every G+ user I followed and note if they maintain a blog or personal website. I'm not sure how much value this effort will have to others, but in the end I did this for me. This is simply my way of saying goodbye to Google+ and recognizing my desire to stay connected with the G+ community through their blogs.

My personal blog contains the complete list of people I followed on Google+ that currently maintain a blog or personal website. Below, is a segment of that list...mainly the Influencers I discovered on Google+ that also have a blog I can follow.

Influenced me via Google+

• Mike Allton - https://bloggingbrute.com/
• John Battelle - https://battellemedia.com/
• Chris Brogan - https://chrisbrogan.com/
• Marques Brownlee - http://mkbhd.com/
• Jason Coward - http://jasoncoward.com/
• Matt Cutts - https://www.mattcutts.com/blog/
• Felicia Day - http://feliciaday.com/
• Mike Elgan -  https://elgan.com/
• Eli Fennell - http://elifennell.com/
• Seth Godin - https://seths.blog/
• Sammy Hagar - http://www.redrocker.com/
• Natsumi Hayashi - http://yowayowacamera.com/
• Alexander Howard - https://digiphile.info/
• Jeff Jarvis - https://buzzmachine.com/
• Guy Kawasaki - https://guykawasaki.com/
• Leo Laporte - https://leolaporte.com/
• Casey McKinnon - http://www.caseymckinnon.com/
• Matt Mullenweg - https://ma.tt/
• Tim O'Reilly - https://www.oreilly.com/tim/
• Phil Nickinson - http://www.moderndad.com/
• JR Raphael - https://www.jrstart.com/
• Kevin Rose - https://www.kevinrose.com/
• Darren Rouse - https://problogger.com/author/darren/
• Liz Strauss - https://www.successful-blog.com/
• Danny Sullivan - https://dannysullivan.com/
• Kas Thomas - http://asserttrue.blogspot.com/
• Steven Vaughan-Nichols - http://practical-tech.com/
• Sarah Rhea Werner - https://www.sarahwerner.com/
• Wil Wheaton - http://wilwheaton.net/
• Jason and Nikki Wynn - http://www.gonewiththewynns.com/

Finally, please note that the inclusion of people on this list or links to their content is not an endorsement of the person's website or ideas.