The Suit Magazine

In another attempt to harness the power of social media, Google announced its Plus function on Tuesday, inviting only a handful of tech insiders to give it a try. On Wednesday, the exclusive users had the chance to invite whomever they wanted to be a part of early development. But almost immediately thereafter, Google Vice President Vic Gundotra put a halt on the free-for-all invites.

“We've shut down invite mechanism for the night. Insane demand. We need to do this carefully, and in a controlled way. Thank you all for your interest!” he posted on Plus.

In addition to the usual features, Google+ incorporates group video chat in the form of “hangouts.”  Connections are also separated into “circles” in which friends can be divided up based on comfort level, with each circle having different privacy settings.

Although velvet rope of exclusivity hasn’t worked in Google’s favor in the past – Google Wave is a prime example – human behavior dictates that people want what they can’t have.

While it is unclear whether Google’s servers could not handle the sudden influx of demand or they are aiming to achieve a false air of exclusivity, experts believe an invite-only system may not be the best choice to promote a social network. The fewer people using the site, the less likely it is for users to get a true feel of what the site would function like in an open environment. “A social site becomes increasingly useful as more of your friends join up to it,” said Duncan Geere, a writer for Wired.com.

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