Before we get started I want to put the title of this post into the proper perspective, right away.
No, I don’t have anything to hold against
Chris Brogan (↑), not at all. He is a fine person! Otherwise I would not follow him on Twitter, in Google Reader, now in Google+, and probably elsewhere.
Unfortunately for him -- I hope his ego can cope with that -- he becomes my poster child for something he is not even responsible for himself. (Life can be tough, isn’t it.)
Chris posts a lot on Google+ (at least now) and his followers are eager to comment and share. The result is that he (as well as other heavy posters like
Robert Scoble (↑),
Trey Ratcliff (↑), … show up first almost every time when I look at my stream.
Don’t get me wrong, I follow them, because they usually have blurbs of value to share. Anything from entertaining to educating …
It’s just that I don’t want them right in my face all the time whenever I look at my stream.
When taking this screenshot above it just happened that
Chris Brogan was up there twice in a row. It was not planned. Seriously. It could as well have been someone else. Sorry, Chris.
Robert Scoble has addressed the problem and has described how you can organize your circles to take your stream back into your possession. You can read
Scoble's tips for newer users of Google+ (↑) (a post on Google+, I believe you can read it even without being signed up for G+). Note his
point 2.b.
But wait a second! Your stream should not be hijacked in first place.
Isn’t that something the user interface is supposed to protect you from? That question might be a bit philosophical and we don’t need to address it here but why should you be foreced to arrange your circles in a certain way so that your stream remains usable?