I think this will invite comparisons to, e.g., killing off Google Reader, but they won't be deserved in my opinion. Google Reader was the leader in its niche, a

I think this will invite comparisons to, e.g., killing off Google Reader, but they won't be deserved in my opinion. Google Reader was the leader in its niche, and when they announced the shutdown everyone had to scramble to find alternative services before all their stuff disappeared. By contrast, this is a niche where the community has clearly moved on to other things that everyone acknowledges as being better in basically every respect. There's just no need for Google to continue to provide this service.