Circles give us the ability to organize all our contacts into groups. So, instead of having 836 friends, you have incredibly more manageable groups such as the ones Plus starts you with—Friends, Acquaintances, Family, and Following (people whose posts you wish to follow but not interact with, like on Twitter).

The above, as already touted more than once in this book and a lot more by Google+ folks and in reviews, is Google's stroke of genius. Circles is the killer feature setting Plus apart from other social media networks. Here are a couple of my circles:

Like everyone else right now, I'm in the process of coming to terms with how circles work. I see all the advantages but, as many of us, have some bad, old Facebook habits to break.

On Facebook, the trap is the whole concept of friends. We're all in a competition to see how many hundreds of people we can friend. So, like many Facebookers, I have no clue who the heck the vast majority of these guys and gals are. I see...