Saying, "it's not a ghost town [for me]" is no more or less valuable than the opposite experience. I'm glad you're enjoying g+, but that fact doesn't say much about the service.
If we wanted to have a substantive discussion about how well G+ is doing, we'd need to know a lot of specifics about G+ (as well as define what 'well' means in this context). Can 540 million active accounts be a ghost town? Depends on what 'active' and 'ghost town' mean. If we're just going to throw around labels without definitions or data, people just end up supporting the idea that feels right in their gut.
Those are hardly enough to make it viable.
1.500.000 views? There are cat videos that have as many...
What really bothers me is Google trying to force it on people through other Google products.
I read Linus and other personalities on G+, I'm also not implying it's a ghost town.
It just didn't gather enough momentum to attract the mass of "regular" casual users.
You write as if Google+ is past tense. I think you've drunk the Kool-aid that TechCrunch is serving. Disclosure: I'm very, very active on Google+, and so are a lot of my friends. I've been circled by about 10,000 users and have almost 1,500,000 views. Google+ is quite popular with a certain demographic: very technical people, engineers, developers, and programmers. Also Android fans, photographers and artsy people.
I'm sorry you don't like Google+, and it's fine with me that you express a negative opinion about it. But let's stop the silly "Google+ is a ghost town" false rhetoric. It's manifestly, demonstrably untrue, and it doesn't do you any favours when you try to make a case like that. Let it go. Let the people who appreciate Google+ enjoy it. Google+ is still growing by leaps and bounds, and I expect it will continue to do so whether you like it or not.