10 ms·

Google is about to learn a tough lesson

372 points by calbucci 14y ago

gfodor 14y ago
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is how odd it is that google is killing a product likely used widely within Google.
- ktsmith 14y ago
  I don't think it's odd. I think the speculation that some reader features are being rolled into plus is accurate and google wants their internal people dog fooding those implementations.
  - thomaslangston 14y ago
    If they were rolling it into G+, they would have announced that first. It simply doesn't make sense to lose your users and then try to regain them, instead of providing a migration strategy.
    - ktsmith 14y ago
      That might make sense if they are a one to one equivalent. I think it is unlikely to be the case however. Losing a few million users of a niche product doesn't matter to Google if it wasn't a large revenue stream. Rolling out features that fit the Google+ scheme as they are ready makes more sense to me.
- wmf 14y ago
  I guess it's a sign of maturity when Google realizes that their own employees are not representative of the general Internet market that Google is targeting.
  - camus 14y ago
    so maybe they should kill ChromeBooks and G+ already , nobody cares about that damn stuff.
  - guard-of-terra 14y ago
    Lying in a coffing in a fancy suit is a sign of maturity too. Why is that kind of maturity good these days? For whom?
- munificent 14y ago
  Buzz was widely used internally when it was killed. I think it may have been more successful inside than out.
llambda 14y ago
> Google made a big mistake cancelling Google Reader that will have severe ripple effects to its empire. Oh come on: enough already. Obviously there was a /vocal/ user base which is very loudly now upset that the product is being sunset. Guess what, Google didn't see it as a large enough set of people to make it worth monetizing. Such is life. Move on. It's certainly not the end of Google if that's what this article is trying to imply. It isn't even the beginning of some horrible backlash either. It is however getting old.
- henrikschroder 14y ago
  I don't think people who use RSS realize what a small minority they are. I don't use RSS or Google Reader, I've never even seen it, but this week my Facebook has been filled by a tiny slice of my friends who are incredibly upset. The vast majority are just shrugging and not caring one bit. Only Google has the actual numbers on how many people are using their Reader, and they simply did the math. End of story. It's not going to affect Google one bit that they cancelled a tiny non-profitable product.
  - ersii 14y ago
    Uhm, I've always thought I've been in a pretty small minority - but at least here in Sweden, RSS reading is pretty normal. Though, the majority of people here aren't using Google Reader - so I guess I'm a minority there - but they're using "Bloglovin". They're pretty large it seems.
    - baby 14y ago
      I don't know anyone in France who use Google reader or others. Maybe power users but even them... it's not that useful.
      - camus 14y ago
        i do , and all the french journalists i know.
Afforess 14y ago
>Third, and lastly, Google is sending a strong signal to the market that it will have no mercy of killing whatever product it doesn’t think it’s going well. Yep. I was just investigating Cloud SQL storage today and Google has a free Cloud SQL trial plan and decent pricing. I passed it over because I am concerned Google isn't interested in long term maintenance of products, and their support is non-existent. I'd rather go with some no-name startup that probably cares a lot more about my business. https://cloud.google.com/pricing/cloud-sql https://cloud.google.com/pricing/cloud-sql
- arkem 14y ago
  [Disclaimer: I work at Google in an unrelated area] Google platforms like Cloud SQL generally have a deprecation policy that will give you an idea of the minimum length of time that they'll be maintained. For Cloud SQL it's 1 year (it's in the Terms of Service), which means that you'd get at least a year's notice before it could be turned off. It's on par or slightly better than what I know of Amazon's policy (they have 1 year deprecation on their APIs and an undefined deprecation policy on their service offerings). In my opnion having this deprecation policy would make Google Cloud SQL a lower risk proposition than a 'no-name startup', at least until the startup is in a position to make similar guarantees (and the financial resources to stick to those guarantees). Edit: I guess my point is that some Google products have service agreements as to how long they'll be maintained and so comparing consumer web services to Cloud SQL isn't really appropriate.
  - mratzloff 14y ago
    Tell that to users of App Engine who have experienced frequent, repeated downtime and utter apathy from Google. Google's customer support sucks.
finnp 14y ago
And as everyone knows the word count tool initiated the downfall of microsoft word empire. Seriously, I don't think it was a bad decision to kill the reader. Not a nice one, but I think certainly not one where Google is going to learn a lesson about.
- Mindless2112 14y ago
  That wasn't quite the point -- it was that the influencers cared about the word-count tool. (You might also notice that Word currently has a word-count tool.)
  - danielweber 14y ago
    I think his story got mangled in a game of telephone. Microsoft loves their word count. Competitors got bit by it, though: This story is as old as the PC. Most of the time, what happens is that they give their program to a journalist to review, and the journalist reviews it by writing their review using the new word processor, and then the journalist tries to find the "word count" feature which they need because most journalists have precise word count requirements, and it's not there, because it's in the "80% that nobody uses," and the journalist ends up writing a story that attempts to claim simultaneously that lite programs are good, bloat is bad, and I can't use this damn thing 'cause it won't count my words. If I had a dollar for every time this has happened I would be very happy. From former Microsoft employee Joel: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000020.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000020.html He has links to reviews in the original There are stories, though, of Microsoft shipping out beta copies of Microsoft Word with debugging all turned on, which made it slow, and despite saying so very carefully to all reviewers who got a copy, they still got torn apart for it being slow. I think the story is in "Coding The Microsoft Way" which I haven't seen in over a decade.
nemothekid 14y ago
I'm unconvinced Google is about to learn anything because this isn't the first time they have killed a product with a large following. It seems now if a product doesn't generate at least 100 million, it isn't safe from being discontinued. So YouTube, will continue to live alongside Search, but it looks like Picassa is on its way to be rebranded "Google+Pictures" Instead it looks like everyone else is going to learn tough lesson - Google isn't a charity, and anything that doesn't provide them any strategic value and/or revenue can be discontinued.
- r00fus 14y ago
  Of course, Google deserves to support/sunset whatever products they want. The danger is that they've tasted Microsoft-level power in their ascendant Android/Chrome business, and want more. There is a lot to be said about "leaving something on the table" and not maximizing everything. When you're the largest collector of personal data (other than perhaps the US Govt), you need goodwill or (influential) people will revile you.
jonknee 14y ago
Similar to the lesson(s) they learned after shutting down Google Code Search, Google Buzz, Jaiku, Google Health or any of the others? You just happened to like a product that was an overall failure. It happens.
OGinparadise 14y ago
Google officially lost the "we're not Facebook /Microsoft /Apple [other "evil empire"] company." They have played that game for way too long and many people fell for it. Since Larry Page took over, Google has lost it's soul; now it's just a greedy, money grubbing machine. Nothing is sacred anymore, no matter how much they repeat http://www.google.com/about/company/philosophy/ http://www.google.com/about/company/philosophy/
- giblfiz 14y ago
  wait... your saying that because they are discontinuing a product? I'm not suggesting that google is/isn't evil these days, but I would suggest that there is absolutely no moral aspect to discontinuing a feed reader.
  - yuhong 14y ago
    Yea, looking at OGinparadise's comment history, OGinparadise is the one who posted that Expedia has lowest prices, despite it's problems (I basically just ignore him now): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868
    - OGinparadise 14y ago
      I used search twice and couldn't find I said that, point me to that comment. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868 Not that there is anything wrong on that, it could have been an opinion on anecdotal evidence. No one expects someone to check prices for 4-5 years first.
      - yuhong 14y ago
        http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5186387 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5186387
        OGinparadise 14y ago
Mindless2112 14y ago
This was my second thought when Google announced that they were retiring Reader (the first was "Nooo!") Half of my friends use Gmail because I suggested that they switch. I am starting to see Google move toward the dark side, and that means you won't see me recommending Google products to friends. It'll take a while, but there will be backlash... because I'm not the only one in this boat.
- dirkk0 14y ago
  Exactly. Axing the reader makes my private and professional life/work way more complicated. That is the first time that a Google believer like me feels they pulled the rug under me.
- tomkarlo 14y ago
  In what way is this a move "towards the dark side"? I understand it's disappointing, but whenever someone doesn't do what you want, do you assume they're evil? There's an underlying sense of entitlement in the tech community that really rubs me the wrong way sometimes, honestly. Sometimes folks are going to make decisions that you don't agree with. That doesn't justify freaking out. "Getting disappointed" shouldn't be filed in the same drawer with "getting cheated" or other such violations.
  - camus 14y ago
    It makes google untrustworthy , where a big entity like Google is supposed to offer stable services. I would have paid for reader , the cost is not an issue , the issue is killing a service without even offering an alternative. The google "dont be evil" propaganda is over. They are as bad as Microsoft and should by treated likewise by the press. And we all know how the press deals with Microsoft.
    - tomkarlo 14y ago
      On what basis does it make Google untrustworthy? Was there some kind of announcement that this service would run forever? Or was that simply your expectation? It's important to differentiate between what other parties are obligated or have promised to do, and what you want them to do. Failing to deliver on the latter is not a violation of trust. It's like saying someone you dated is untrustworthy because they decided to break up with you and they didn't find you someone new to date.
notatoad 14y ago
Perhaps google learns a tough lesson. Or perhaps bloggers who think they are "influencers" are going to learn a tough lesson about how much impact their influence really has. Google knows what they're doing. They haven't forgotten the outrage that happened after they stripped the social features out of reader and replaced it with the +1 button. They knew all those people and more would be pissed. And they decided it didn't matter.
- crander 14y ago
  No, they hoped it wouldn't mater. Unless they've perfected the ability to predict the future they and everyone else won't know for quite some time.
  - saraid216 14y ago
    How will we tell whether or not it matters?
- alenonimo 14y ago
  It's not the same thing. When G+ killed Google Reader's "sharebro" social network, Google Reader still was the best feed reader of the market by a long shot. Just like now, there was nowhere to run. Heck, I kept using it, just like anyone complaining. I kept recommending it because it was GReader or a fucking magazine-layout shitty app. But now they are definetely killing it, and it will affect the users in a different way. They are trashing away the app so there's no way a user can simply adapt. Before you could say "well, at least I can keep reading the feeds". Now you got nothing. About influencers, well, there are lots of people with a good chunk of influence using GReader. They might make a dent on how people perceive Google's app reliability. Even a small one could end up in some financial loss. If it would be significant to them, only time will tell. By the way, have you noticed that the Google+ still didn't catch up? What if it's Google Reader users fault? Think about it.
simonsarris 14y ago
I sympathize with Google Reader users. I find it occasionally tiresome to be half-foot in an ecosystem. But I've come to accept that this is just the way that Google does things. I love Gmail/Calendar/Maps/DamnNearEverything. I love Groups, which they've recently taken pains to hide[1] so I suspect its up soon for the chopping block. Heck I even love Google+. All that said, at least they had the gall to kill it. One thing that pains me more than killing a product they don't want is letting one languish broken for ages. I'm fully in the G-cosystem[2] but sadly Google Finance is nearly worthless, and only edited about once a year, usually to break something and fix it a month later. You can't switch to a current (non-closed) holdings view where it only shows you information about stocks you own right now, instead you have to make two portfolios. You can't reorder portfolios so my real portfolios and my "lookers" are separated in an awkward list. News stories are half spam and appear out of order anyway. Finance doesn't sync well with the Android app, sometimes it finds zero portfolios and makes me make temporary mobile ones that I have to delete later. How many Java errors are on the Finance homepage today? Just one. How about on a stock ticker page? Thirty-one. And it's still using Flash. I don't think the Reader backlash will hurt Google. There are just some products they plainly don't care about and will continue to ignore them until somebody brushes over the "shutter" button while the rest of the company shrugs. ~~~ [1] http://i.imgur.com/bs7i5pL.png http://i.imgur.com/bs7i5pL.png Groups isn't even on the extended products list in the Gmail header bar, though Reader is! You have to click "Even more" to get to Groups. [2] I cringed writing that but it was too good to let go.
- camus 14y ago
  I think it will hurt Google. Who use reader ? journalists , analysts , and they are pissed off. I dont recall such a huge reaction when other Google services shut down.
  - danilocampos 14y ago
    Yeah. They're furious. https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280 https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280
cek 14y ago
I love Marcello and am a fan, but this is an emotional, not well thought through reaction. The best leaders, the best organizations, the ones that create excellence, are those that are as good at saying no as they are at saying yes. I've worked at a large company. It is easy for outsiders to think "oh, they have infinite resources and can do anything". This is not the case at all. I am not much of a Google fan. I dropped Reader about 2 years ago and have used NewsBlur since. The only Google product I like is Chrome. Google will continue to be successful, not by doing a bazillion little things poorly, but a few things, really, really well. And to do a few things, really, really well, you have to be excellent at saying no. Google has decided Reader is a little thing it could not do really, really, well. So it is saying no. I applaud that. (Even if it's caused NewsBlur to become almost too slow to use).
- CamperBob2 14y ago
  The best leaders, the best organizations, the ones that create excellence, are those that are as good at saying no as they are at saying yes. Google doesn't say "No." They say "Yes... yes... yes... no! Just kidding! Psych!" I can't tie my personal or corporate strategy to that.
  - deleted 14y ago
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WiseWeasel 14y ago
What are "influencers" going to do about it? Give Reader a bad review? Complain about the death of a product no one knew existed? I don't see how they have any leverage in this situation. The comparison with Microsoft's Word Count incident seems weakly relevant.
- nlawalker 14y ago
  >> What are "influencers" going to do about it? Give Reader a bad review? No, but you may start seeing instances of phrases like "I wonder how long it will be until FeatureX/ProductY gets the boot like Reader did" or "Perhaps this product will languish for years without innovation like Reader" or "Maybe Google will opt to ignore users of this product too" in the press related to Google products. Next time Google kills a product, the media will reflect about how it's "just as bad as what they did with Reader in 2013." Killing widely used products is now something Google does; it is a behavior they are now strongly associated with. In terms of influencers, it's not about the individual product, it's about the behavior of the company that operated it. Don't piss off the people that give you free advertising by taking out features they like, even if they're the only ones who use them. >> a product no one knew existed While I find that a stretch, the point the article was making is that no one needs to know of the existence of Reader for this to have a negative impact on Google. Except for the influencers, who did.
- OGinparadise 14y ago
  View Google at a new light, not give them the benefit of a doubt. If Google does something, they'll try to see what's the catch. Google has gotten a lot of good, free press
- anigbrowl 14y ago
  Well, I've been a strong promoter of Google's products over the years; I recommend them to others, show people how to use them, use them for project organization (thus pushing my usage pattern out to the rest of a team) and so on. I'm not about to suddenly stop doing that, but I feel an awful less invested than I did 48 hours ago.
webwanderings 14y ago
Makes a lot of sense. As an average Joe, I am preparing to go on Google-free diet come July 1. Firefox, Bing, Outlook. Will find a reader somehow. These are the daily habits which accumulate over time and provide GOOGLE what it needs to survive. So will do everything possible to cut down the ...
- sentenza 14y ago
  Better go yandex than bing. They at least manage to be ahead of google in some niches.
mcintyre1994 14y ago
The right way to respond to this backlash would be to make Reader a paid app and tell people it'll stay while enough pay for it (and of course be transparent about user count etc). I can't see Google going that way though, it was free and if they don't want to pay to support it there's no reason to expect them to.
- r00fus 14y ago
  Reader is getting the axe because it's getting in the way of the new protege project, G+. They can't have anything holding Google from becoming what they think Facebook should be. In fact, they don't just want to become/defeat Facebook, but also Apple (see Nexus/Chromebook) and Amazon (see Shopping Express), not to mention Groupon (see Offers). By trying to be all things, they will become none. They are on the path to becoming Microsoft. I desperately hope that the Glass/Driverless-car part of the company prevails in corporate culture. I fear that will not be the case.
  - camus 14y ago
    > By trying to be all things, they will become none. I just agree 100% they are an advertising company ,that's all they will ever be. The rest is bull. And i'm not going to use any of their vaporware anymore. But it's a great wake up call against all this Saas bull* , i guess journalists had a taste of what the implications of cloud computing are.
    - mcintyre1994 14y ago
      I don't think that's fair. They're an AI/machine learning company at heart now. Primarily that powers advertising of course, but they have the potential to do so much more.
      - r00fus 14y ago
        Just that it used to be that they'd do it because it was cool, and potentially profitable. Now they'd do things to be profitable first, and cool as a side effect. It's arguable which iterative path leads to a greater market social and market impact.
jblock 14y ago
I can't wait for this debacle to stop being news. Google cancelled a product. It let you read websites quickly. There are other ways to do it. Moving on...
kevink245 14y ago
An article full of nonsense. Discontinuing Google Reader IS NOT sending a message to enterprises that they should not use Google product for the long term.
- ak217 14y ago
  Sorry, but your statement needs more to back it up, because the opposing viewpoint has an easy logical justification. Why should companies transfer their core infrastructure onto Google's products if they know Google might decide one day to discontinue them? I know lots of companies rely on and pay for GMail, I'm sure it won't be discontinued anytime soon, but I'm also sure this event puts thoughts in the back of many people's minds about that eventuality.
  - kevink245 14y ago
    Companies don't run their infrastructure off Google Reader! How can you compare this to gmail? Google makes money off gmail (Companies pay for Google apps) - not Google Reader...
  - Hytosys 14y ago
    The day that e-mail becomes widely irrelevant is the day that Google thoughtfully cancels Gmail. Google is a business. If they lose enough customers, it's not worth maintaining an expensive system just to satisfy the vocal minority who gets up and writes self-entitled articles like OP's. Google has been pulling plugs on services for the longest time; they're not a charity, they're a company. I don't think this makes them evil!
vineet 14y ago
If Google is shutting down reader, are they going to remove RSS feeds from Blogger? What about Feedburner? I think Google's better move would have been cut a few features and 'Plus-ify' Reader - kinda like they have been doing with their other products. They would have evolved an important user base, shown commitment to the RSS standard, and kept a number of important apps using their api's. Aren't they after all supposed to be championing the open web? I don't think this is intentional, but it now hard to argue againsT people saying that they intentionally waited till they killed the RSS readers market and then shut down their product.
- camus 14y ago
  blogger and feedburner are next. They want you to move to spooky G+ ...
danilocampos 14y ago
So, what's going to happen, exactly? "Influencers" who liked Google Reader, now jilted, are going to use their magic influence beam to halt the growth of Android, to erode the dominance of Google in search, and prevent the regulatory approval of self-driving cars? Google has quite a few heavy responsibilities on their hands. They have to manage growth and competition in hugely complex, emerging fields. The lesson they learned correctly was that focus is essential. RSS is dead. A handful of nerds enjoy it, it solves a handful of problems, but it's not a hot technology around which you can build a business on the scale that will move needles for Google. So they cut it and they're not even going to notice it in the rearview mirror. In an amusing, if anecdotal, aside – Gina Trapani, an OG nerd influencer if ever there was one, tweeted that she'd checked out of Google Reader long ago. https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280 https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
  - danilocampos 14y ago
    > You dont know a damn thing about RSS , Aaron Schwartz did not died so a dch like you can claim RSS is dead , go back to your Twitter/Facebook/write your dumb social network here/ sandbox ... you just dont have a clue... Yeah, tell me more about Aaron "Schwartz."
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
      - danilocampos 14y ago
        Stupidity has, indeed, been made abundantly clear here. Bravo.
      - codesuela 14y ago
        congrats for providing a textbook example of a non constructive answer
badhairday 14y ago
"Microsoft new about it but didn’t care because it had data that showed that feature was just minimally used." What?
ebiester 14y ago
If it isn't Google search or Gmail, I'm not making any decisions that depend on it. It's that simple. And frankly, I'm likely moving my email off it as soon as I get some spare bandwidth to find something I like enough. (I really like webmail.)
zer0gravity 14y ago
I guess they're doing everything they can to get everyone to Google+. If they can't bait you, they force you. They want their own Facebook. Probably Blogger will also be phased out as soon as they afford to. But I don't think the future will belong neither to Google+ nor Facebook. I'm looking forward to a descentralized, user centric platform, that anyone can run on its raspberry pi box at home, that allows you to manage your data however you please.
- camus 14y ago
  Far in the future when all these social networks are dead , RSS will still be alive , because it is a open protocol thus promote interoperability.
  - icebraining 14y ago
    I like RSS and don't have social network accounts, but so what? Way before these companies die, others will have taken their place and do their job.
- fernly 14y ago
  They are still "enhancing" Blogger. Less than a month ago they introduced a drastic change in the image-upload UI that basically broke it for everyone. It appears to have been meant as an improvement but whoever did it, clearly didn't understand who used it and how. Now they are "looking at" how they can fix it. So what are the good alternatives to Blogger? And what if you have multiple blogs with hundreds of posts in them? Reader at least is emphemeral, there's no investment of work at risk.
  - mkr-hn 14y ago
    WordPress.com can import from Blogger, and then export an almost human-readable XML file with posts. It costs money to point your own domain at it, but it has a DNS editor (text-based, but it has some click-based tools). It's worth the small price if you're concerned with easy portability. And it's not a peripheral service like Blogger. Automattic is WordPress.com, and all their peripheral products exist to serve it. The best part? You can take your WordPress.com and turn it into an identical WordPress.org with a billion different service providers.
carbon8 14y ago
Parts of this post are premised the "influencer" marketing model, but there is at least some research indicating that it might not be as powerful as generally assumed. For example: * http://misc.si.umich.edu/media/papers/wsdm333w-bakshy.pdf http://misc.si.umich.edu/media/papers/wsdm333w-bakshy.pdf * http://www.digitaltonto.com/wp-content/uploads/WattsandDoddinfluentials.pdf http://www.digitaltonto.com/wp-content/uploads/WattsandDoddi... "Grouped: How small groups of friends are the key to influence on the social web," the book by Paul Adams @ Facebook (http://www.amazon.com/Grouped-groups-friends-influence-social/dp/0321804112 http://www.amazon.com/Grouped-groups-friends-influence-socia...), talks a bit about this. Anecdotally, I've also seen quite a bit of evidence first hand that suggests the impact of influencers is not clear-cut.
deleted 14y ago
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andr3w321 14y ago
Meh, I don't use google reader or really care, but I am pissed they plan on ending igoogle in November. It's insane to me that they will do this. It's my homepage and I'm sure millions of other people's homepages. Setting your homepage to an internet company's site is pretty much their whole goal. It's insane to me that they will give this up.
- stcredzero 14y ago
  > Setting your homepage to an internet company's site is pretty much their whole goal. That always felt hokey to me. I was always more likely to "homepage" a website that just gave me great content and proportionately less likely to "homepage" a site that wanted to be my home page. This is why HN/reddit are basically this for me.
- takluyver 14y ago
  I think we all tend to assume that our computer habits are shared by millions of nameless other people. Presumably, Google have data on how many people visit igoogle, and it doesn't seem worth keeping. My nameless millions and I no longer have a 'homepage' - the browser just starts with the tabs I had open last time.
twelvechairs 14y ago
It shouldn't really come as a surprise that Google is acting more and more now like a big established company with shareholders (which they are). When you become an established industry leader (as a profit-driven shareholder company), you tend to focus on minimising overheads, cutting cruft and focusing on core profit-driven services. They aren't going to be benevolent dictators of the internet forever - we should be thankful that their benevolence has lasted so long (and still is lasting through many free services provided).
hlfcoding 14y ago
I'm biased about this topic, but don't take my word for it. Robert Scoble is one such 'influencer' and here's his take and the discussion around it: https://www.facebook.com/RobertScoble/posts/499071000129201 https://www.facebook.com/RobertScoble/posts/499071000129201 Key takeaway: it's not the 'vast majority' that bring about innovation and change on the web. It might be Google doesn't care about innovating on the web front anymore, at least less than the hardware and integrated systems fronts. So ironically, this might actually hurt Plus.
- ivix 14y ago
  Precisely. Google exists because of the nerd minority! Once they lose sight of that they're doomed. Who do they think will be the early adopters of self driving cars?
IgorPartola 14y ago
Look, the TFA is full of crap. Here is the reality: today I would have a hard time coming up with a better alternative for a free productivity suite and search engine for most individuals and small to medium enterprises. When I am talking to someone looking to run things under their own domain, they might ask "do you think Google is going to discontinue support for Apps/GMail/Docs/Drive/etc?" To which I would have to reply "very unlikely". I think the OP overestimates the influence of the people that used GR. Sure, some had pull but the pragmatic ones can see the difference between Google's flagship products and GR. There are plenty of reasons to not buy into the Google Ecosystem, but this is not one of them. Then again, all we need to do is wait a few months and see if the earnings report supports the OP's claim or Google's strategy. My money is ong Google.
dstroot 14y ago
How I read HN: 1) Subscribe to HN feed in Google Reader 2) Install Reeder app everywhere (phone, iPad, laptop) 3) Link Reeder to Google Reader 4) Read happy... all items synced across all platforms, read, unread, starred. 5) Any time I have a free moment I pop open Reeder on my phone and read HN. I don't give a %$@*%& about "social"... Mission #1 is now to find another service that will reliably feed RSS feeds into Reeder.
Thiz 14y ago
I haven't used a feed reader in more than three years. I believe that fad is gone. Google has closed many more important services and they're still strong. Nop. There is no lesson to be learnt.
eCa 14y ago
> Third, and lastly, Google is sending a strong signal to the market that it will have no mercy of killing whatever product it doesn’t think it’s going well. They have been doing that for years. I'm not sure if anything but Search and Gmail are safe from the axe. They'll probably not end-of-life Maps or G+, but almost anything else should probably be treated as a beta that can be removed at will.
- mkr-hn 14y ago
  I read a post a while back where someone theorized that Google owns enough fiber to make YouTube inexpensive to run, and it's deeply embedded in the minds of most web users.
stcredzero 14y ago
> First, Google says that it “gets” social, but you can’t “get” social if you don’t get the concept of an influencer. By killing a product that was beloved and heavily used by most influencers, you start to alienate those folks. If op is right about Google Reader users, then the same thing is happening with OS X users. A part of the reason for OS X's success was adoption by influencers. Samsung, Android, and others have made a lot of inroads on influencer groups.
kevinalexbrown 14y ago
I love the idea of loss-leaders aimed at a specific, influential segment of the entire market. I'd never really thought of services like that. I'm curious what uses there are for this specific type of loss-leader (as in not the Dropbox freemium type). Ethics aside, for instance, Google could have tried to steer conversation among an influential group toward certain topics, by more aggressively suggesting certain Google blogs to follow, or specific stories relevant to Google. I'm also very curious what other such loss-leading services exist. One example is this forum. It advertises to potential founders with the small banner ad at the upper-left-hand corner of the screen. It also provides an ecosystem for the discussions about and (indirect) promotions of organizations or ideas YC invests in (like Watsi, or job postings). The other example I can think of is "high-brow" political magazines like The National Review. Often, parties dedicated time and money on promoting ideas there, even though it's a very small segment of the entire market of voters. Has anyone here designed a service or product with this specific aim in mind? How did you use it to further some broader agenda?
- csense 14y ago
  Microsoft's vulnerable among college students in computer/IT fields, because they have technical knowledge, lots of time on their hands and little money -- a perfect audience for FOSS. So they offer big academic discounts to try to keep them in the Microsoft ecosystem.
jmount 14y ago
I think we are all just going to learn the tough lesson of how little we matter.
samspot 14y ago
RSS was a literal life changer when I first discovered it. Instead of going to the 5-10 websites I frequented to look for new stories throughout the day, I could check my reader when I took a break and stay up to date on everything. It probably cut my surfing time by 90% or more. Additionally RSS allows me to follow far more things than would normally be possible. Instead of 10 I have 100, including things that don't update even every month. Previously the discussion was always about how to make RSS usable for the masses, but I suppose this problem was never solved. Social media seems to work for some people, but it isn't the same. I can only count a handful of times in the last decade that I site I was interested in didn't have an RSS feed. It is practically universal. Facebook does indeed have a lot of people, but there is also the constant friend spam, and the algorithmic filtering to worry about. When I look at the alternatives to Google Reader, it is clear that many of them don't get me. They are focused on content discovery, but i want to do is Keep Track. I don't want to miss a word from my favorite sources, and I need my reader to hold on to their words until I get to them. I really hope RSS doesn't die. It is my handle on the internet, and without it I would still be refreshing sites all day.
- baby 14y ago
  It was a change of life for me too. But a bad one. Instead of checking my favorite websites separately I started checking a hundred websites. I would eat information. I would get a new post every 30 seconds. I would spend my days just sitting at my desk and archiving what didn't seem of interest and read the rest. After a few month I started realizing I wasn't enjoying what was written anymore. I wasn't enjoying visiting a website, its design, its UI (And I know the saying, we're not supposed to learn a new UI every time we browse a new website, but I like seeing a websites renovating its design, I like reading an article in its real environment )... I decided to ditch it. I didn't need the technology. Nobody needed the technology. I didn't mind opening multiple tabs to check different websites. I use bookmarks, multi row toolbar and tree style tab on Firefox and it's all I need for my big consumption. And I'm a power user. So imagine the normal users, why would they care about Google Reader?
  - veridies 14y ago
joejohnson 14y ago
I'm not saying that Google "gets" social (because they obviously don't), but everyone I know who uses Google Reader is definitely not the influencer type.
joshualastdon 14y ago
My first inclination seeing the title of this post even before I read the article was to comment, "are you a fortune teller?" But seriously, to put it mildly my friend, I don't agree with you. Google determined that the best thing to do was to kill it and they did. They continue building other stuff; life continues.
marknutter 14y ago
Twitter and Facebook killed RSS. It's a far friendlier interface for people to keep up with news and people they find interesting. Geeks may be lamenting the loss of Google Reader, but they make up a very small percentage of the internet population these days. When I suggest that Twitter/Facebook is the new RSS I often catch a lot of flack for it, but honestly, that's how far more people consume information than any other service.
- camus 14y ago
  > When I suggest that Twitter/Facebook is the new RSS please explain how twitter and facebook are open protocols so i can suscribe facebook or twitter feeds on the long run without my facebook/twitter reader client breaking because of changes in the api or without having to create an account on their plateform. RSS exists because it allows free flow of information. I dont recall facebook or twitter being open plateforms that promote interoperability.
  - marknutter 14y ago
    You're missing the point entirely. You are correct, they are not open protocols you can subscribe blah blah blah; ask a non hacker news reader if they care about any of that. You're answer will be "no". Twitter/Facebook are RSS for non techies, and they far outnumber non-techies.
- illicium 14y ago
  I can't subscribe to <insert-generic-Wordpress-blog-here> with Twitter/Facebook. With RSS, content authors only have to update their websites and not worry about crossposting to a social feed.
  - marknutter 14y ago
    That's exactly what "following" is.
- anigbrowl 14y ago
  It's a far friendlier interface for people to keep up with news and people they find interesting. A preference for having things automatically sorted into neat categories may not be as unusual as you think.
nonamegiven 14y ago
Why would Google want to maintain and promote an app that makes it easy for people to go to non-Google sites?
- ganz 14y ago
  Isn't that the core purpose of Google Search?
  - OGinparadise 14y ago
    it was
ozataman 14y ago
I'll say this: This behavior by Google has gotten me for the first time to take a deeper look at Microsoft's 365. I'll also be much more careful in the future before using GCE for a real business purpose.
- icebraining 14y ago
  Yeah, MS is oh so much more trustworthy. Like when they discontinued POP (and IMAP?) access on Hotmail accounts, before Gmail came about.
stretchwithme 14y ago
Seems like wishful thinking.
edsm 14y ago
As a user of Google Reader, I'm kind of glad it's going away. Why? Because now good quality web-based RSS feed readers will finally arise. Sure, there are some out there now, but with Google's monopoly on the product nobody really cared about them and they weren't very good or reliable. Now that will be forced to change. To me this is like if in 2002 Microsoft had decided to stop making Internet Explorer and force everyone to use a different browser - quality browsers would have been developed and adopted a lot faster.
losethos 14y ago
Word count is hard and ugly. I wish I had good spelling check -- crappy dictionary. God says... Austria sufficient Greece expectation unfailingly impatient Wordly remembereth apostles longed neighbouring recount subduedst impaired approached goaded Law untainted punishment solemnise rmunday calleth represent personages unallowed attentively horrible hence supported haunt replace shuns slipped Whereas questioned despite discuss attuned profession doubtfulness disclaimers vaster Information readily credit eased slave overflowed foster-brother compacting compassing thats_right four-footed oftentimes Texas findeth you_better_not Knoweth wont_you_be_my_neighbor shadows perished nativity-casters literature that's_your_opinion victory marriageable commanding meat Poland Babylonian providence vintage-vacation fishes everything these session presumption tumultuous sentence -what Confessions grievest distinguishing plainer approach fig Whosoever figure after sorrowfulness Libanus securely trade salt unaided
ddunkin 14y ago
How many little web services have you all used, that have come and gone over the years, that never had as much money behind them as Google? Most people are going to trust that Google has a better chance long-term, even if the product has a chance of going away some day. I am always leery of my data with small companies, and make sure there is a good backup/exit strategy (obviously, this applies to Google too). I see a lot of passionate tweets over just another web service. If Google wasn't killing the service, but asking users to spread the word to keep the service, would they be so passionate about it then? Maybe. People don't often go to Twitter when their service is working, generally when they're pissed (unless the service is mind-blowing great). I just don't think all the whining is going to do much convincing at this point, or that it will impact Google all that much.
DelvarWorld 14y ago
haha, no it's not. no one is going to care about this in a grand total of 3 days.
jhonovich 14y ago
I saw a HackerNews thread ranking/listing RSS alternatives, found Feedly was the top one and migrated my feeds from google reader. Now, I kick myself for using Google Reader all this time when Feedly is clearly far better (for me). While I've lost a little respect for Google, I am overall happy to find a better RSS reader alternative.
richardw 14y ago
If I were Microsoft I'd be pushing Bing Reader out the door ASAP. I'm sure they'd find a use for all those disgruntled influencers.
arihant 14y ago
This just shows Google just doesn't get design. Sure, they may have figured out CSS3 and made Gmail super hard to use, but they don't really get design. Ever noticed how Facebook kills a feature? Slow, steady, they drift you away, showing you by hand what better is out there, and then the feature disappears, first from our conscious, and then from the website. If FB was the one calling shots here, they probably would have somehow merged G+ and Reader, and then slowly started to show us those stories better using Currents, and by the time everyone is comfortable, would have killed Reader. Google doesn't get design. It has to be in everything. Even in killing products off, there is design. You can't design with a corporate sledgehammer. All they seem to be doing is kill off established niche products in hopes of somehow making a niche social network successful. If only someone builds a better search engine, right this moment.
- anigbrowl 14y ago
  An astute observation (and I say that as someone who dislikes Facebook and only logs in for about 1 hour a month).
- calbucci 14y ago
  This is a great observation. Google could have turned all this frustration into energy for Google+, but they didn't.
WilliamTJ 14y ago
Google Reader is not just a feed but also as a tool for many people that are oppress by internet censorship it the only way people get free information and fight oppression... I guess Google don't care http://www.technologyreview.com/view/512566/unintentional-interfaces-google-readers-censorship-busting-power-will-be-hard-to/ http://www.technologyreview.com/view/512566/unintentional-in...
binderbizingdos 14y ago
all of this (I think) is Larry Page in action. for a long time there was no clear strategy with Schmidt. "products" would pop up everywhere with no clear relationship. now Larry is cutting the wild growth. while it hurts some people I think in general it will strengthen Google. > Oh, and I’m pissed with Google Reader going away. I used it 3-10 times a day to consume about 100+ feeds. look, if you want to have a more effective RSS reading habit, use rss2email http://www.allthingsrss.com/rss2email/ http://www.allthingsrss.com/rss2email/ and plug into the power of email-filtering. you don't even have to go to some "reader" to get updated.
ommunist 14y ago
Heck, if you display feed titles, excerpts from Google Reader aggregated feed on your website, this will be dead too!
pyrocrasty 14y ago
> Sure, I’m pretty sure Gmail is not going away, but what ... YouTube? I think a lot of products would be happy to as precarious a future as Youtube...
campuscodi 14y ago
If you really want Google to bring Reader back we should all delete our Google+ accounts. Not banter in a corner of the Internet.
esalman 14y ago
With this decision, Google made it lot easier for our company to choose between self-hosted mail server and Google Apps business account.
devnetfx 14y ago
- Reader wars start again. This can be a big positive from this news. Already people are finding new readers to meet their needs. It will drive innovation and I expect to see some great products coming in. - As many people know things were pretty stagnant on Google Reader. Though it worked for a lot of us, products like Google+ were always going to get more focus. In this way Google might have done us a service by retiring a product it was not developing fully. - Wonder if the product name was a limitation in itself. Google Reader was always going to be a reader even if you add social stuff into it. If that is the case, maybe they should rename Google Finance to Google Money! - People are asking if we can trust with Google on providing all these free services. Pragmatic among us say "NO" and will remind us that they have been saying this for ages. Optimistic among us say, well "Gmail", "Youtube" etc. are for "forever". - Most people like Google services because it means "one login", and it goes all the way to help Android as well. Even if some people are considering their relationships with Google, it is not in Google's best interests. - Another side effect of the above is - what happens on next spring cleaning? Should I wait to use a product until that product acquires enough momentum? I will be a bit more hesitant to recommend other Google products. - There is a debate going on between free and paid services. I think it is more about getting a right business model. Services can fail even if you pay them. Most people are not going to pay more than $5/$10 a month for a service like this. - A big opportunity for a company like Yahoo to get an app for all the devices, and among the influencers. I will be surprised if they don't try to raise their game on readers and provide a better "Google Reader". (this advice is for other companies as well, however I believe, yahoo, will be the one to grab it.) - Was a bit surprised with all the bitching going on at hacker news. I mean, let them close it, we will have another one or built a new one! And, no petitions please.
jenko 14y ago
fcuk Google. fcuk corp evil.
alexfarran 14y ago
It's very easy to make up a story like the one about MS Word after the event. Not so easy to predict in advance who these influencers are, who they influence, and if they exist in the first place. Duncan Watts has researched this and there's an interview here. http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/scientist-influencer-theory-bogus-105981 http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/scientist-in... " They throw parties or they give away free samples or they advertise in particular publications that brand themselves as reaching an influential audience and run some campaign in their normal manner. And if it works, they say, "We reached the influencers." And if it doesn't work, they say "We didn't reach the influencers" or "We weren't able to make them help us." In that sense, it's just a rhetorical device to help you explain the randomness that you actually experience in the world. "
- disgruntledphd2 14y ago
  That was an extremely interesting link, thank you.
Xion 14y ago
I love how the closure of Reader reveals something about the tech journalists and "celebrities". They throw tantrums. They throws hissy fits. They scream bloody murder. They divine doom and gloom for Google about how severely this will affect it in much more important markets like Android and Chrome. And yet the world is not ending, and not every Facebook wall has this petition [1] plastered all over. Even GOOG stock underwent as a much as a correction, still hovering comfortably above $800. What did happen, though, is that self-important "opinion leaders" had their illusions of power dispelled. No wonder they are furious. [1] https://www.change.org/petitions/google-keep-google-reader-running https://www.change.org/petitions/google-keep-google-reader-r...
- mkr-hn 14y ago
  It's too soon to say whether or not the power of the trendsetters was illusory. The nature of trendsetting is that the setters have to figure out what it means for them before they can communicate it. Any change will take time to distribute itself.
chaostheory 14y ago
"By killing a product that was beloved and heavily used by most influencers, you start to alienate those folks. Killing a product like Picnik with tens of millions of users, might have less impact on the business than killing a product with less than a million users, where most of those users are influencers." Reminds me of what Apple is doing with the Mac Pro.
idont 14y ago
Google has made a pure "Top-down decision". Apple also made one like this: replace Google Maps by Maps Apple style. #Fail
csense 14y ago
Actually, I'd say it's the audience that learns a tough lesson: If you use an application that requires a server operated by somebody else, there's never a guarantee that the service will operate forever. This is a compelling argument in favor of DRM-free desktop applications.
sdeville 14y ago
No one mentioned it in the thread so far. I am working in academia, and RSS is a lifesaver for us, to keep track of new academic papers. I am following around 50 journals, everyone of which publishes a few articles daily, at least. That makes around 1k papers/month. There's no way for us to check every journal website every morning. Twitter or Facebook are totally unsuitable for this. My second constraint is that during my day, I use 2 different computers, a phone and an iPad to check on my RSS feed, depending on where I am and what I do. Reader was providing a flawless solution for the sync. There will be another one soon, that's ok. But according to my twitter stream, many, many people in academia are pissed off about this decision. I posted my feelings here http://wp.me/p1eIvd-d2 http://wp.me/p1eIvd-d2
kolev 14y ago
I had exactly the same feelings when I heard about the decision. Now I'm planning to stop using Google Voice, which has the same indications of getting killed soon (zero development, no promotion, etc.) I am less excited about Google+ as well - I just cannot tolerate a company that kills features and products like this. This decision from Google is really damaging to them and they are idiots of they don't see it. This "focus" thing applies to small shops. Google is huge. They can afford to keep a product like Google Reader - small shops can't.

372 points by calbucci 14y ago

gfodor 14y ago

One thing I haven't seen mentioned is how odd it is that google is killing a product likely used widely within Google.

ktsmith 14y ago
I don't think it's odd. I think the speculation that some reader features are being rolled into plus is accurate and google wants their internal people dog fooding those implementations.
- thomaslangston 14y ago
  If they were rolling it into G+, they would have announced that first. It simply doesn't make sense to lose your users and then try to regain them, instead of providing a migration strategy.
  - ktsmith 14y ago
    That might make sense if they are a one to one equivalent. I think it is unlikely to be the case however. Losing a few million users of a niche product doesn't matter to Google if it wasn't a large revenue stream. Rolling out features that fit the Google+ scheme as they are ready makes more sense to me.
wmf 14y ago
I guess it's a sign of maturity when Google realizes that their own employees are not representative of the general Internet market that Google is targeting.
- camus 14y ago
  so maybe they should kill ChromeBooks and G+ already , nobody cares about that damn stuff.
- guard-of-terra 14y ago
  Lying in a coffing in a fancy suit is a sign of maturity too. Why is that kind of maturity good these days? For whom?
munificent 14y ago
Buzz was widely used internally when it was killed. I think it may have been more successful inside than out.

llambda 14y ago

> Google made a big mistake cancelling Google Reader that will have severe ripple effects to its empire. Oh come on: enough already. Obviously there was a /vocal/ user base which is very loudly now upset that the product is being sunset. Guess what, Google didn't see it as a large enough set of people to make it worth monetizing. Such is life. Move on. It's certainly not the end of Google if that's what this article is trying to imply. It isn't even the beginning of some horrible backlash either. It is however getting old.

henrikschroder 14y ago
I don't think people who use RSS realize what a small minority they are. I don't use RSS or Google Reader, I've never even seen it, but this week my Facebook has been filled by a tiny slice of my friends who are incredibly upset. The vast majority are just shrugging and not caring one bit. Only Google has the actual numbers on how many people are using their Reader, and they simply did the math. End of story. It's not going to affect Google one bit that they cancelled a tiny non-profitable product.
- ersii 14y ago
  Uhm, I've always thought I've been in a pretty small minority - but at least here in Sweden, RSS reading is pretty normal. Though, the majority of people here aren't using Google Reader - so I guess I'm a minority there - but they're using "Bloglovin". They're pretty large it seems.
  - baby 14y ago
    I don't know anyone in France who use Google reader or others. Maybe power users but even them... it's not that useful.
    - camus 14y ago
      i do , and all the french journalists i know.

Afforess 14y ago

>Third, and lastly, Google is sending a strong signal to the market that it will have no mercy of killing whatever product it doesn’t think it’s going well. Yep. I was just investigating Cloud SQL storage today and Google has a free Cloud SQL trial plan and decent pricing. I passed it over because I am concerned Google isn't interested in long term maintenance of products, and their support is non-existent. I'd rather go with some no-name startup that probably cares a lot more about my business. https://cloud.google.com/pricing/cloud-sql https://cloud.google.com/pricing/cloud-sql

arkem 14y ago
[Disclaimer: I work at Google in an unrelated area] Google platforms like Cloud SQL generally have a deprecation policy that will give you an idea of the minimum length of time that they'll be maintained. For Cloud SQL it's 1 year (it's in the Terms of Service), which means that you'd get at least a year's notice before it could be turned off. It's on par or slightly better than what I know of Amazon's policy (they have 1 year deprecation on their APIs and an undefined deprecation policy on their service offerings). In my opnion having this deprecation policy would make Google Cloud SQL a lower risk proposition than a 'no-name startup', at least until the startup is in a position to make similar guarantees (and the financial resources to stick to those guarantees). Edit: I guess my point is that some Google products have service agreements as to how long they'll be maintained and so comparing consumer web services to Cloud SQL isn't really appropriate.
- mratzloff 14y ago
  Tell that to users of App Engine who have experienced frequent, repeated downtime and utter apathy from Google. Google's customer support sucks.

finnp 14y ago

And as everyone knows the word count tool initiated the downfall of microsoft word empire. Seriously, I don't think it was a bad decision to kill the reader. Not a nice one, but I think certainly not one where Google is going to learn a lesson about.

Mindless2112 14y ago
That wasn't quite the point -- it was that the influencers cared about the word-count tool. (You might also notice that Word currently has a word-count tool.)
- danielweber 14y ago
  I think his story got mangled in a game of telephone. Microsoft loves their word count. Competitors got bit by it, though: This story is as old as the PC. Most of the time, what happens is that they give their program to a journalist to review, and the journalist reviews it by writing their review using the new word processor, and then the journalist tries to find the "word count" feature which they need because most journalists have precise word count requirements, and it's not there, because it's in the "80% that nobody uses," and the journalist ends up writing a story that attempts to claim simultaneously that lite programs are good, bloat is bad, and I can't use this damn thing 'cause it won't count my words. If I had a dollar for every time this has happened I would be very happy. From former Microsoft employee Joel: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000020.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000020.html He has links to reviews in the original There are stories, though, of Microsoft shipping out beta copies of Microsoft Word with debugging all turned on, which made it slow, and despite saying so very carefully to all reviewers who got a copy, they still got torn apart for it being slow. I think the story is in "Coding The Microsoft Way" which I haven't seen in over a decade.

nemothekid 14y ago

I'm unconvinced Google is about to learn anything because this isn't the first time they have killed a product with a large following. It seems now if a product doesn't generate at least 100 million, it isn't safe from being discontinued. So YouTube, will continue to live alongside Search, but it looks like Picassa is on its way to be rebranded "Google+Pictures" Instead it looks like everyone else is going to learn tough lesson - Google isn't a charity, and anything that doesn't provide them any strategic value and/or revenue can be discontinued.

r00fus 14y ago
Of course, Google deserves to support/sunset whatever products they want. The danger is that they've tasted Microsoft-level power in their ascendant Android/Chrome business, and want more. There is a lot to be said about "leaving something on the table" and not maximizing everything. When you're the largest collector of personal data (other than perhaps the US Govt), you need goodwill or (influential) people will revile you.

jonknee 14y ago

Similar to the lesson(s) they learned after shutting down Google Code Search, Google Buzz, Jaiku, Google Health or any of the others? You just happened to like a product that was an overall failure. It happens.

OGinparadise 14y ago

Google officially lost the "we're not Facebook /Microsoft /Apple [other "evil empire"] company." They have played that game for way too long and many people fell for it. Since Larry Page took over, Google has lost it's soul; now it's just a greedy, money grubbing machine. Nothing is sacred anymore, no matter how much they repeat http://www.google.com/about/company/philosophy/ http://www.google.com/about/company/philosophy/

giblfiz 14y ago
wait... your saying that because they are discontinuing a product? I'm not suggesting that google is/isn't evil these days, but I would suggest that there is absolutely no moral aspect to discontinuing a feed reader.
- yuhong 14y ago
  Yea, looking at OGinparadise's comment history, OGinparadise is the one who posted that Expedia has lowest prices, despite it's problems (I basically just ignore him now): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868
  - OGinparadise 14y ago
    I used search twice and couldn't find I said that, point me to that comment. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4965868 Not that there is anything wrong on that, it could have been an opinion on anecdotal evidence. No one expects someone to check prices for 4-5 years first.
    - yuhong 14y ago
      http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5186387 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5186387
      - OGinparadise 14y ago

Mindless2112 14y ago

This was my second thought when Google announced that they were retiring Reader (the first was "Nooo!") Half of my friends use Gmail because I suggested that they switch. I am starting to see Google move toward the dark side, and that means you won't see me recommending Google products to friends. It'll take a while, but there will be backlash... because I'm not the only one in this boat.

dirkk0 14y ago
Exactly. Axing the reader makes my private and professional life/work way more complicated. That is the first time that a Google believer like me feels they pulled the rug under me.
tomkarlo 14y ago
In what way is this a move "towards the dark side"? I understand it's disappointing, but whenever someone doesn't do what you want, do you assume they're evil? There's an underlying sense of entitlement in the tech community that really rubs me the wrong way sometimes, honestly. Sometimes folks are going to make decisions that you don't agree with. That doesn't justify freaking out. "Getting disappointed" shouldn't be filed in the same drawer with "getting cheated" or other such violations.
- camus 14y ago
  It makes google untrustworthy , where a big entity like Google is supposed to offer stable services. I would have paid for reader , the cost is not an issue , the issue is killing a service without even offering an alternative. The google "dont be evil" propaganda is over. They are as bad as Microsoft and should by treated likewise by the press. And we all know how the press deals with Microsoft.
  - tomkarlo 14y ago
    On what basis does it make Google untrustworthy? Was there some kind of announcement that this service would run forever? Or was that simply your expectation? It's important to differentiate between what other parties are obligated or have promised to do, and what you want them to do. Failing to deliver on the latter is not a violation of trust. It's like saying someone you dated is untrustworthy because they decided to break up with you and they didn't find you someone new to date.

notatoad 14y ago

Perhaps google learns a tough lesson. Or perhaps bloggers who think they are "influencers" are going to learn a tough lesson about how much impact their influence really has. Google knows what they're doing. They haven't forgotten the outrage that happened after they stripped the social features out of reader and replaced it with the +1 button. They knew all those people and more would be pissed. And they decided it didn't matter.

crander 14y ago
No, they hoped it wouldn't mater. Unless they've perfected the ability to predict the future they and everyone else won't know for quite some time.
- saraid216 14y ago
  How will we tell whether or not it matters?
alenonimo 14y ago
It's not the same thing. When G+ killed Google Reader's "sharebro" social network, Google Reader still was the best feed reader of the market by a long shot. Just like now, there was nowhere to run. Heck, I kept using it, just like anyone complaining. I kept recommending it because it was GReader or a fucking magazine-layout shitty app. But now they are definetely killing it, and it will affect the users in a different way. They are trashing away the app so there's no way a user can simply adapt. Before you could say "well, at least I can keep reading the feeds". Now you got nothing. About influencers, well, there are lots of people with a good chunk of influence using GReader. They might make a dent on how people perceive Google's app reliability. Even a small one could end up in some financial loss. If it would be significant to them, only time will tell. By the way, have you noticed that the Google+ still didn't catch up? What if it's Google Reader users fault? Think about it.

simonsarris 14y ago

I sympathize with Google Reader users. I find it occasionally tiresome to be half-foot in an ecosystem. But I've come to accept that this is just the way that Google does things. I love Gmail/Calendar/Maps/DamnNearEverything. I love Groups, which they've recently taken pains to hide[1] so I suspect its up soon for the chopping block. Heck I even love Google+. All that said, at least they had the gall to kill it. One thing that pains me more than killing a product they don't want is letting one languish broken for ages. I'm fully in the G-cosystem[2] but sadly Google Finance is nearly worthless, and only edited about once a year, usually to break something and fix it a month later. You can't switch to a current (non-closed) holdings view where it only shows you information about stocks you own right now, instead you have to make two portfolios. You can't reorder portfolios so my real portfolios and my "lookers" are separated in an awkward list. News stories are half spam and appear out of order anyway. Finance doesn't sync well with the Android app, sometimes it finds zero portfolios and makes me make temporary mobile ones that I have to delete later. How many Java errors are on the Finance homepage today? Just one. How about on a stock ticker page? Thirty-one. And it's still using Flash. I don't think the Reader backlash will hurt Google. There are just some products they plainly don't care about and will continue to ignore them until somebody brushes over the "shutter" button while the rest of the company shrugs. ~~~ [1] http://i.imgur.com/bs7i5pL.png http://i.imgur.com/bs7i5pL.png Groups isn't even on the extended products list in the Gmail header bar, though Reader is! You have to click "Even more" to get to Groups. [2] I cringed writing that but it was too good to let go.

camus 14y ago
I think it will hurt Google. Who use reader ? journalists , analysts , and they are pissed off. I dont recall such a huge reaction when other Google services shut down.
- danilocampos 14y ago
  Yeah. They're furious. https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280 https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280

cek 14y ago

I love Marcello and am a fan, but this is an emotional, not well thought through reaction. The best leaders, the best organizations, the ones that create excellence, are those that are as good at saying no as they are at saying yes. I've worked at a large company. It is easy for outsiders to think "oh, they have infinite resources and can do anything". This is not the case at all. I am not much of a Google fan. I dropped Reader about 2 years ago and have used NewsBlur since. The only Google product I like is Chrome. Google will continue to be successful, not by doing a bazillion little things poorly, but a few things, really, really well. And to do a few things, really, really well, you have to be excellent at saying no. Google has decided Reader is a little thing it could not do really, really, well. So it is saying no. I applaud that. (Even if it's caused NewsBlur to become almost too slow to use).

CamperBob2 14y ago
The best leaders, the best organizations, the ones that create excellence, are those that are as good at saying no as they are at saying yes. Google doesn't say "No." They say "Yes... yes... yes... no! Just kidding! Psych!" I can't tie my personal or corporate strategy to that.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]

WiseWeasel 14y ago

What are "influencers" going to do about it? Give Reader a bad review? Complain about the death of a product no one knew existed? I don't see how they have any leverage in this situation. The comparison with Microsoft's Word Count incident seems weakly relevant.

nlawalker 14y ago
>> What are "influencers" going to do about it? Give Reader a bad review? No, but you may start seeing instances of phrases like "I wonder how long it will be until FeatureX/ProductY gets the boot like Reader did" or "Perhaps this product will languish for years without innovation like Reader" or "Maybe Google will opt to ignore users of this product too" in the press related to Google products. Next time Google kills a product, the media will reflect about how it's "just as bad as what they did with Reader in 2013." Killing widely used products is now something Google does; it is a behavior they are now strongly associated with. In terms of influencers, it's not about the individual product, it's about the behavior of the company that operated it. Don't piss off the people that give you free advertising by taking out features they like, even if they're the only ones who use them. >> a product no one knew existed While I find that a stretch, the point the article was making is that no one needs to know of the existence of Reader for this to have a negative impact on Google. Except for the influencers, who did.
OGinparadise 14y ago
View Google at a new light, not give them the benefit of a doubt. If Google does something, they'll try to see what's the catch. Google has gotten a lot of good, free press
anigbrowl 14y ago
Well, I've been a strong promoter of Google's products over the years; I recommend them to others, show people how to use them, use them for project organization (thus pushing my usage pattern out to the rest of a team) and so on. I'm not about to suddenly stop doing that, but I feel an awful less invested than I did 48 hours ago.

webwanderings 14y ago

Makes a lot of sense. As an average Joe, I am preparing to go on Google-free diet come July 1. Firefox, Bing, Outlook. Will find a reader somehow. These are the daily habits which accumulate over time and provide GOOGLE what it needs to survive. So will do everything possible to cut down the ...

sentenza 14y ago
Better go yandex than bing. They at least manage to be ahead of google in some niches.

mcintyre1994 14y ago

The right way to respond to this backlash would be to make Reader a paid app and tell people it'll stay while enough pay for it (and of course be transparent about user count etc). I can't see Google going that way though, it was free and if they don't want to pay to support it there's no reason to expect them to.

r00fus 14y ago
Reader is getting the axe because it's getting in the way of the new protege project, G+. They can't have anything holding Google from becoming what they think Facebook should be. In fact, they don't just want to become/defeat Facebook, but also Apple (see Nexus/Chromebook) and Amazon (see Shopping Express), not to mention Groupon (see Offers). By trying to be all things, they will become none. They are on the path to becoming Microsoft. I desperately hope that the Glass/Driverless-car part of the company prevails in corporate culture. I fear that will not be the case.
- camus 14y ago
  > By trying to be all things, they will become none. I just agree 100% they are an advertising company ,that's all they will ever be. The rest is bull. And i'm not going to use any of their vaporware anymore. But it's a great wake up call against all this Saas bull* , i guess journalists had a taste of what the implications of cloud computing are.
  - mcintyre1994 14y ago
    I don't think that's fair. They're an AI/machine learning company at heart now. Primarily that powers advertising of course, but they have the potential to do so much more.
    - r00fus 14y ago
      Just that it used to be that they'd do it because it was cool, and potentially profitable. Now they'd do things to be profitable first, and cool as a side effect. It's arguable which iterative path leads to a greater market social and market impact.

jblock 14y ago

I can't wait for this debacle to stop being news. Google cancelled a product. It let you read websites quickly. There are other ways to do it. Moving on...

kevink245 14y ago

An article full of nonsense. Discontinuing Google Reader IS NOT sending a message to enterprises that they should not use Google product for the long term.

ak217 14y ago
Sorry, but your statement needs more to back it up, because the opposing viewpoint has an easy logical justification. Why should companies transfer their core infrastructure onto Google's products if they know Google might decide one day to discontinue them? I know lots of companies rely on and pay for GMail, I'm sure it won't be discontinued anytime soon, but I'm also sure this event puts thoughts in the back of many people's minds about that eventuality.
- kevink245 14y ago
  Companies don't run their infrastructure off Google Reader! How can you compare this to gmail? Google makes money off gmail (Companies pay for Google apps) - not Google Reader...
- Hytosys 14y ago
  The day that e-mail becomes widely irrelevant is the day that Google thoughtfully cancels Gmail. Google is a business. If they lose enough customers, it's not worth maintaining an expensive system just to satisfy the vocal minority who gets up and writes self-entitled articles like OP's. Google has been pulling plugs on services for the longest time; they're not a charity, they're a company. I don't think this makes them evil!

vineet 14y ago

If Google is shutting down reader, are they going to remove RSS feeds from Blogger? What about Feedburner? I think Google's better move would have been cut a few features and 'Plus-ify' Reader - kinda like they have been doing with their other products. They would have evolved an important user base, shown commitment to the RSS standard, and kept a number of important apps using their api's. Aren't they after all supposed to be championing the open web? I don't think this is intentional, but it now hard to argue againsT people saying that they intentionally waited till they killed the RSS readers market and then shut down their product.

camus 14y ago
blogger and feedburner are next. They want you to move to spooky G+ ...

danilocampos 14y ago

So, what's going to happen, exactly? "Influencers" who liked Google Reader, now jilted, are going to use their magic influence beam to halt the growth of Android, to erode the dominance of Google in search, and prevent the regulatory approval of self-driving cars? Google has quite a few heavy responsibilities on their hands. They have to manage growth and competition in hugely complex, emerging fields. The lesson they learned correctly was that focus is essential. RSS is dead. A handful of nerds enjoy it, it solves a handful of problems, but it's not a hot technology around which you can build a business on the scale that will move needles for Google. So they cut it and they're not even going to notice it in the rearview mirror. In an amusing, if anecdotal, aside – Gina Trapani, an OG nerd influencer if ever there was one, tweeted that she'd checked out of Google Reader long ago. https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280 https://twitter.com/ginatrapani/status/312451705692385280

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
- danilocampos 14y ago
  > You dont know a damn thing about RSS , Aaron Schwartz did not died so a dch like you can claim RSS is dead , go back to your Twitter/Facebook/write your dumb social network here/ sandbox ... you just dont have a clue... Yeah, tell me more about Aaron "Schwartz."
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
    - danilocampos 14y ago
      Stupidity has, indeed, been made abundantly clear here. Bravo.
    - codesuela 14y ago
      congrats for providing a textbook example of a non constructive answer

badhairday 14y ago

"Microsoft new about it but didn’t care because it had data that showed that feature was just minimally used." What?

ebiester 14y ago

If it isn't Google search or Gmail, I'm not making any decisions that depend on it. It's that simple. And frankly, I'm likely moving my email off it as soon as I get some spare bandwidth to find something I like enough. (I really like webmail.)

zer0gravity 14y ago

I guess they're doing everything they can to get everyone to Google+. If they can't bait you, they force you. They want their own Facebook. Probably Blogger will also be phased out as soon as they afford to. But I don't think the future will belong neither to Google+ nor Facebook. I'm looking forward to a descentralized, user centric platform, that anyone can run on its raspberry pi box at home, that allows you to manage your data however you please.

camus 14y ago
Far in the future when all these social networks are dead , RSS will still be alive , because it is a open protocol thus promote interoperability.
- icebraining 14y ago
  I like RSS and don't have social network accounts, but so what? Way before these companies die, others will have taken their place and do their job.
fernly 14y ago
They are still "enhancing" Blogger. Less than a month ago they introduced a drastic change in the image-upload UI that basically broke it for everyone. It appears to have been meant as an improvement but whoever did it, clearly didn't understand who used it and how. Now they are "looking at" how they can fix it. So what are the good alternatives to Blogger? And what if you have multiple blogs with hundreds of posts in them? Reader at least is emphemeral, there's no investment of work at risk.
- mkr-hn 14y ago
  WordPress.com can import from Blogger, and then export an almost human-readable XML file with posts. It costs money to point your own domain at it, but it has a DNS editor (text-based, but it has some click-based tools). It's worth the small price if you're concerned with easy portability. And it's not a peripheral service like Blogger. Automattic is WordPress.com, and all their peripheral products exist to serve it. The best part? You can take your WordPress.com and turn it into an identical WordPress.org with a billion different service providers.

carbon8 14y ago

Parts of this post are premised the "influencer" marketing model, but there is at least some research indicating that it might not be as powerful as generally assumed. For example: * http://misc.si.umich.edu/media/papers/wsdm333w-bakshy.pdf http://misc.si.umich.edu/media/papers/wsdm333w-bakshy.pdf * http://www.digitaltonto.com/wp-content/uploads/WattsandDoddinfluentials.pdf http://www.digitaltonto.com/wp-content/uploads/WattsandDoddi... "Grouped: How small groups of friends are the key to influence on the social web," the book by Paul Adams @ Facebook (http://www.amazon.com/Grouped-groups-friends-influence-social/dp/0321804112 http://www.amazon.com/Grouped-groups-friends-influence-socia...), talks a bit about this. Anecdotally, I've also seen quite a bit of evidence first hand that suggests the impact of influencers is not clear-cut.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

andr3w321 14y ago

Meh, I don't use google reader or really care, but I am pissed they plan on ending igoogle in November. It's insane to me that they will do this. It's my homepage and I'm sure millions of other people's homepages. Setting your homepage to an internet company's site is pretty much their whole goal. It's insane to me that they will give this up.

stcredzero 14y ago
> Setting your homepage to an internet company's site is pretty much their whole goal. That always felt hokey to me. I was always more likely to "homepage" a website that just gave me great content and proportionately less likely to "homepage" a site that wanted to be my home page. This is why HN/reddit are basically this for me.
takluyver 14y ago
I think we all tend to assume that our computer habits are shared by millions of nameless other people. Presumably, Google have data on how many people visit igoogle, and it doesn't seem worth keeping. My nameless millions and I no longer have a 'homepage' - the browser just starts with the tabs I had open last time.

twelvechairs 14y ago

It shouldn't really come as a surprise that Google is acting more and more now like a big established company with shareholders (which they are). When you become an established industry leader (as a profit-driven shareholder company), you tend to focus on minimising overheads, cutting cruft and focusing on core profit-driven services. They aren't going to be benevolent dictators of the internet forever - we should be thankful that their benevolence has lasted so long (and still is lasting through many free services provided).

hlfcoding 14y ago

I'm biased about this topic, but don't take my word for it. Robert Scoble is one such 'influencer' and here's his take and the discussion around it: https://www.facebook.com/RobertScoble/posts/499071000129201 https://www.facebook.com/RobertScoble/posts/499071000129201 Key takeaway: it's not the 'vast majority' that bring about innovation and change on the web. It might be Google doesn't care about innovating on the web front anymore, at least less than the hardware and integrated systems fronts. So ironically, this might actually hurt Plus.

ivix 14y ago
Precisely. Google exists because of the nerd minority! Once they lose sight of that they're doomed. Who do they think will be the early adopters of self driving cars?

IgorPartola 14y ago

Look, the TFA is full of crap. Here is the reality: today I would have a hard time coming up with a better alternative for a free productivity suite and search engine for most individuals and small to medium enterprises. When I am talking to someone looking to run things under their own domain, they might ask "do you think Google is going to discontinue support for Apps/GMail/Docs/Drive/etc?" To which I would have to reply "very unlikely". I think the OP overestimates the influence of the people that used GR. Sure, some had pull but the pragmatic ones can see the difference between Google's flagship products and GR. There are plenty of reasons to not buy into the Google Ecosystem, but this is not one of them. Then again, all we need to do is wait a few months and see if the earnings report supports the OP's claim or Google's strategy. My money is ong Google.

dstroot 14y ago

How I read HN: 1) Subscribe to HN feed in Google Reader 2) Install Reeder app everywhere (phone, iPad, laptop) 3) Link Reeder to Google Reader 4) Read happy... all items synced across all platforms, read, unread, starred. 5) Any time I have a free moment I pop open Reeder on my phone and read HN. I don't give a %$@*%& about "social"... Mission #1 is now to find another service that will reliably feed RSS feeds into Reeder.

Thiz 14y ago

I haven't used a feed reader in more than three years. I believe that fad is gone. Google has closed many more important services and they're still strong. Nop. There is no lesson to be learnt.

eCa 14y ago

> Third, and lastly, Google is sending a strong signal to the market that it will have no mercy of killing whatever product it doesn’t think it’s going well. They have been doing that for years. I'm not sure if anything but Search and Gmail are safe from the axe. They'll probably not end-of-life Maps or G+, but almost anything else should probably be treated as a beta that can be removed at will.

mkr-hn 14y ago
I read a post a while back where someone theorized that Google owns enough fiber to make YouTube inexpensive to run, and it's deeply embedded in the minds of most web users.

stcredzero 14y ago

> First, Google says that it “gets” social, but you can’t “get” social if you don’t get the concept of an influencer. By killing a product that was beloved and heavily used by most influencers, you start to alienate those folks. If op is right about Google Reader users, then the same thing is happening with OS X users. A part of the reason for OS X's success was adoption by influencers. Samsung, Android, and others have made a lot of inroads on influencer groups.

kevinalexbrown 14y ago

I love the idea of loss-leaders aimed at a specific, influential segment of the entire market. I'd never really thought of services like that. I'm curious what uses there are for this specific type of loss-leader (as in not the Dropbox freemium type). Ethics aside, for instance, Google could have tried to steer conversation among an influential group toward certain topics, by more aggressively suggesting certain Google blogs to follow, or specific stories relevant to Google. I'm also very curious what other such loss-leading services exist. One example is this forum. It advertises to potential founders with the small banner ad at the upper-left-hand corner of the screen. It also provides an ecosystem for the discussions about and (indirect) promotions of organizations or ideas YC invests in (like Watsi, or job postings). The other example I can think of is "high-brow" political magazines like The National Review. Often, parties dedicated time and money on promoting ideas there, even though it's a very small segment of the entire market of voters. Has anyone here designed a service or product with this specific aim in mind? How did you use it to further some broader agenda?

csense 14y ago
Microsoft's vulnerable among college students in computer/IT fields, because they have technical knowledge, lots of time on their hands and little money -- a perfect audience for FOSS. So they offer big academic discounts to try to keep them in the Microsoft ecosystem.

jmount 14y ago

I think we are all just going to learn the tough lesson of how little we matter.

samspot 14y ago

RSS was a literal life changer when I first discovered it. Instead of going to the 5-10 websites I frequented to look for new stories throughout the day, I could check my reader when I took a break and stay up to date on everything. It probably cut my surfing time by 90% or more. Additionally RSS allows me to follow far more things than would normally be possible. Instead of 10 I have 100, including things that don't update even every month. Previously the discussion was always about how to make RSS usable for the masses, but I suppose this problem was never solved. Social media seems to work for some people, but it isn't the same. I can only count a handful of times in the last decade that I site I was interested in didn't have an RSS feed. It is practically universal. Facebook does indeed have a lot of people, but there is also the constant friend spam, and the algorithmic filtering to worry about. When I look at the alternatives to Google Reader, it is clear that many of them don't get me. They are focused on content discovery, but i want to do is Keep Track. I don't want to miss a word from my favorite sources, and I need my reader to hold on to their words until I get to them. I really hope RSS doesn't die. It is my handle on the internet, and without it I would still be refreshing sites all day.

baby 14y ago
It was a change of life for me too. But a bad one. Instead of checking my favorite websites separately I started checking a hundred websites. I would eat information. I would get a new post every 30 seconds. I would spend my days just sitting at my desk and archiving what didn't seem of interest and read the rest. After a few month I started realizing I wasn't enjoying what was written anymore. I wasn't enjoying visiting a website, its design, its UI (And I know the saying, we're not supposed to learn a new UI every time we browse a new website, but I like seeing a websites renovating its design, I like reading an article in its real environment )... I decided to ditch it. I didn't need the technology. Nobody needed the technology. I didn't mind opening multiple tabs to check different websites. I use bookmarks, multi row toolbar and tree style tab on Firefox and it's all I need for my big consumption. And I'm a power user. So imagine the normal users, why would they care about Google Reader?
- veridies 14y ago

joejohnson 14y ago

I'm not saying that Google "gets" social (because they obviously don't), but everyone I know who uses Google Reader is definitely not the influencer type.

joshualastdon 14y ago

My first inclination seeing the title of this post even before I read the article was to comment, "are you a fortune teller?" But seriously, to put it mildly my friend, I don't agree with you. Google determined that the best thing to do was to kill it and they did. They continue building other stuff; life continues.

marknutter 14y ago

Twitter and Facebook killed RSS. It's a far friendlier interface for people to keep up with news and people they find interesting. Geeks may be lamenting the loss of Google Reader, but they make up a very small percentage of the internet population these days. When I suggest that Twitter/Facebook is the new RSS I often catch a lot of flack for it, but honestly, that's how far more people consume information than any other service.

camus 14y ago
> When I suggest that Twitter/Facebook is the new RSS please explain how twitter and facebook are open protocols so i can suscribe facebook or twitter feeds on the long run without my facebook/twitter reader client breaking because of changes in the api or without having to create an account on their plateform. RSS exists because it allows free flow of information. I dont recall facebook or twitter being open plateforms that promote interoperability.
- marknutter 14y ago
  You're missing the point entirely. You are correct, they are not open protocols you can subscribe blah blah blah; ask a non hacker news reader if they care about any of that. You're answer will be "no". Twitter/Facebook are RSS for non techies, and they far outnumber non-techies.
illicium 14y ago
I can't subscribe to <insert-generic-Wordpress-blog-here> with Twitter/Facebook. With RSS, content authors only have to update their websites and not worry about crossposting to a social feed.
- marknutter 14y ago
  That's exactly what "following" is.
anigbrowl 14y ago
It's a far friendlier interface for people to keep up with news and people they find interesting. A preference for having things automatically sorted into neat categories may not be as unusual as you think.

nonamegiven 14y ago

Why would Google want to maintain and promote an app that makes it easy for people to go to non-Google sites?

ganz 14y ago
Isn't that the core purpose of Google Search?
- OGinparadise 14y ago
  it was

ozataman 14y ago

I'll say this: This behavior by Google has gotten me for the first time to take a deeper look at Microsoft's 365. I'll also be much more careful in the future before using GCE for a real business purpose.

icebraining 14y ago
Yeah, MS is oh so much more trustworthy. Like when they discontinued POP (and IMAP?) access on Hotmail accounts, before Gmail came about.

stretchwithme 14y ago

Seems like wishful thinking.

edsm 14y ago

As a user of Google Reader, I'm kind of glad it's going away. Why? Because now good quality web-based RSS feed readers will finally arise. Sure, there are some out there now, but with Google's monopoly on the product nobody really cared about them and they weren't very good or reliable. Now that will be forced to change. To me this is like if in 2002 Microsoft had decided to stop making Internet Explorer and force everyone to use a different browser - quality browsers would have been developed and adopted a lot faster.

losethos 14y ago

Word count is hard and ugly. I wish I had good spelling check -- crappy dictionary. God says... Austria sufficient Greece expectation unfailingly impatient Wordly remembereth apostles longed neighbouring recount subduedst impaired approached goaded Law untainted punishment solemnise rmunday calleth represent personages unallowed attentively horrible hence supported haunt replace shuns slipped Whereas questioned despite discuss attuned profession doubtfulness disclaimers vaster Information readily credit eased slave overflowed foster-brother compacting compassing thats_right four-footed oftentimes Texas findeth you_better_not Knoweth wont_you_be_my_neighbor shadows perished nativity-casters literature that's_your_opinion victory marriageable commanding meat Poland Babylonian providence vintage-vacation fishes everything these session presumption tumultuous sentence -what Confessions grievest distinguishing plainer approach fig Whosoever figure after sorrowfulness Libanus securely trade salt unaided

ddunkin 14y ago

How many little web services have you all used, that have come and gone over the years, that never had as much money behind them as Google? Most people are going to trust that Google has a better chance long-term, even if the product has a chance of going away some day. I am always leery of my data with small companies, and make sure there is a good backup/exit strategy (obviously, this applies to Google too). I see a lot of passionate tweets over just another web service. If Google wasn't killing the service, but asking users to spread the word to keep the service, would they be so passionate about it then? Maybe. People don't often go to Twitter when their service is working, generally when they're pissed (unless the service is mind-blowing great). I just don't think all the whining is going to do much convincing at this point, or that it will impact Google all that much.

DelvarWorld 14y ago

haha, no it's not. no one is going to care about this in a grand total of 3 days.

jhonovich 14y ago

I saw a HackerNews thread ranking/listing RSS alternatives, found Feedly was the top one and migrated my feeds from google reader. Now, I kick myself for using Google Reader all this time when Feedly is clearly far better (for me). While I've lost a little respect for Google, I am overall happy to find a better RSS reader alternative.

richardw 14y ago

If I were Microsoft I'd be pushing Bing Reader out the door ASAP. I'm sure they'd find a use for all those disgruntled influencers.

arihant 14y ago

This just shows Google just doesn't get design. Sure, they may have figured out CSS3 and made Gmail super hard to use, but they don't really get design. Ever noticed how Facebook kills a feature? Slow, steady, they drift you away, showing you by hand what better is out there, and then the feature disappears, first from our conscious, and then from the website. If FB was the one calling shots here, they probably would have somehow merged G+ and Reader, and then slowly started to show us those stories better using Currents, and by the time everyone is comfortable, would have killed Reader. Google doesn't get design. It has to be in everything. Even in killing products off, there is design. You can't design with a corporate sledgehammer. All they seem to be doing is kill off established niche products in hopes of somehow making a niche social network successful. If only someone builds a better search engine, right this moment.

anigbrowl 14y ago
An astute observation (and I say that as someone who dislikes Facebook and only logs in for about 1 hour a month).
calbucci 14y ago
This is a great observation. Google could have turned all this frustration into energy for Google+, but they didn't.

WilliamTJ 14y ago

Google Reader is not just a feed but also as a tool for many people that are oppress by internet censorship it the only way people get free information and fight oppression... I guess Google don't care http://www.technologyreview.com/view/512566/unintentional-interfaces-google-readers-censorship-busting-power-will-be-hard-to/ http://www.technologyreview.com/view/512566/unintentional-in...

binderbizingdos 14y ago

all of this (I think) is Larry Page in action. for a long time there was no clear strategy with Schmidt. "products" would pop up everywhere with no clear relationship. now Larry is cutting the wild growth. while it hurts some people I think in general it will strengthen Google. > Oh, and I’m pissed with Google Reader going away. I used it 3-10 times a day to consume about 100+ feeds. look, if you want to have a more effective RSS reading habit, use rss2email http://www.allthingsrss.com/rss2email/ http://www.allthingsrss.com/rss2email/ and plug into the power of email-filtering. you don't even have to go to some "reader" to get updated.

ommunist 14y ago

Heck, if you display feed titles, excerpts from Google Reader aggregated feed on your website, this will be dead too!

pyrocrasty 14y ago

> Sure, I’m pretty sure Gmail is not going away, but what ... YouTube? I think a lot of products would be happy to as precarious a future as Youtube...

campuscodi 14y ago

If you really want Google to bring Reader back we should all delete our Google+ accounts. Not banter in a corner of the Internet.

esalman 14y ago

With this decision, Google made it lot easier for our company to choose between self-hosted mail server and Google Apps business account.

devnetfx 14y ago

- Reader wars start again. This can be a big positive from this news. Already people are finding new readers to meet their needs. It will drive innovation and I expect to see some great products coming in. - As many people know things were pretty stagnant on Google Reader. Though it worked for a lot of us, products like Google+ were always going to get more focus. In this way Google might have done us a service by retiring a product it was not developing fully. - Wonder if the product name was a limitation in itself. Google Reader was always going to be a reader even if you add social stuff into it. If that is the case, maybe they should rename Google Finance to Google Money! - People are asking if we can trust with Google on providing all these free services. Pragmatic among us say "NO" and will remind us that they have been saying this for ages. Optimistic among us say, well "Gmail", "Youtube" etc. are for "forever". - Most people like Google services because it means "one login", and it goes all the way to help Android as well. Even if some people are considering their relationships with Google, it is not in Google's best interests. - Another side effect of the above is - what happens on next spring cleaning? Should I wait to use a product until that product acquires enough momentum? I will be a bit more hesitant to recommend other Google products. - There is a debate going on between free and paid services. I think it is more about getting a right business model. Services can fail even if you pay them. Most people are not going to pay more than $5/$10 a month for a service like this. - A big opportunity for a company like Yahoo to get an app for all the devices, and among the influencers. I will be surprised if they don't try to raise their game on readers and provide a better "Google Reader". (this advice is for other companies as well, however I believe, yahoo, will be the one to grab it.) - Was a bit surprised with all the bitching going on at hacker news. I mean, let them close it, we will have another one or built a new one! And, no petitions please.

jenko 14y ago

fcuk Google. fcuk corp evil.

alexfarran 14y ago

It's very easy to make up a story like the one about MS Word after the event. Not so easy to predict in advance who these influencers are, who they influence, and if they exist in the first place. Duncan Watts has researched this and there's an interview here. http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/scientist-influencer-theory-bogus-105981 http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/scientist-in... " They throw parties or they give away free samples or they advertise in particular publications that brand themselves as reaching an influential audience and run some campaign in their normal manner. And if it works, they say, "We reached the influencers." And if it doesn't work, they say "We didn't reach the influencers" or "We weren't able to make them help us." In that sense, it's just a rhetorical device to help you explain the randomness that you actually experience in the world. "

disgruntledphd2 14y ago
That was an extremely interesting link, thank you.

Xion 14y ago

I love how the closure of Reader reveals something about the tech journalists and "celebrities". They throw tantrums. They throws hissy fits. They scream bloody murder. They divine doom and gloom for Google about how severely this will affect it in much more important markets like Android and Chrome. And yet the world is not ending, and not every Facebook wall has this petition [1] plastered all over. Even GOOG stock underwent as a much as a correction, still hovering comfortably above $800. What did happen, though, is that self-important "opinion leaders" had their illusions of power dispelled. No wonder they are furious. [1] https://www.change.org/petitions/google-keep-google-reader-running https://www.change.org/petitions/google-keep-google-reader-r...

mkr-hn 14y ago
It's too soon to say whether or not the power of the trendsetters was illusory. The nature of trendsetting is that the setters have to figure out what it means for them before they can communicate it. Any change will take time to distribute itself.

chaostheory 14y ago

"By killing a product that was beloved and heavily used by most influencers, you start to alienate those folks. Killing a product like Picnik with tens of millions of users, might have less impact on the business than killing a product with less than a million users, where most of those users are influencers." Reminds me of what Apple is doing with the Mac Pro.

idont 14y ago

Google has made a pure "Top-down decision". Apple also made one like this: replace Google Maps by Maps Apple style. #Fail

csense 14y ago

Actually, I'd say it's the audience that learns a tough lesson: If you use an application that requires a server operated by somebody else, there's never a guarantee that the service will operate forever. This is a compelling argument in favor of DRM-free desktop applications.

sdeville 14y ago

No one mentioned it in the thread so far. I am working in academia, and RSS is a lifesaver for us, to keep track of new academic papers. I am following around 50 journals, everyone of which publishes a few articles daily, at least. That makes around 1k papers/month. There's no way for us to check every journal website every morning. Twitter or Facebook are totally unsuitable for this. My second constraint is that during my day, I use 2 different computers, a phone and an iPad to check on my RSS feed, depending on where I am and what I do. Reader was providing a flawless solution for the sync. There will be another one soon, that's ok. But according to my twitter stream, many, many people in academia are pissed off about this decision. I posted my feelings here http://wp.me/p1eIvd-d2 http://wp.me/p1eIvd-d2

kolev 14y ago

I had exactly the same feelings when I heard about the decision. Now I'm planning to stop using Google Voice, which has the same indications of getting killed soon (zero development, no promotion, etc.) I am less excited about Google+ as well - I just cannot tolerate a company that kills features and products like this. This decision from Google is really damaging to them and they are idiots of they don't see it. This "focus" thing applies to small shops. Google is huge. They can afford to keep a product like Google Reader - small shops can't.