Comments for Google Giveth, and Taketh Away: Google Video, Notebook, Catalog Search, Jaiku, and Dodgeball to Shut Down

Google Giveth, and Taketh Away: Google Video, Notebook, Catalog Search, Jaiku, and Dodgeball to Shut Down

2009-01-15T03:18:04Z

A number of Google services just announced that they are about to shut down. The Google Video team announced that it will shut down uploads in a few months, while the Google Notebook team announced that it is stopping development (the service will continue to function, however). According to Danny Sullivan, Google is also closing Jaiku, a Twitter-like micro-blogging service that was bought by Google before it even launched, but which has lingered in invite-only mode ever since. Google Catalog search, which made shopping catalogs searchable, will also be closed soon.

]]> Update: Google will release the Jaiku code under the open source Apache license, so that other organizations can pick up where the Google team left off. It is not clear if current users will be able to transfer their accounts.

Another, relatively unknown project that is being closed now, is the Mashup Editor, which was based on the Google App Engine, and never left a very limited, private beta.

Will You Miss These Services?

That Google would shut down Google Video is not exactly a surprise, given that Google's own YouTube is far more popular. Google's Catalog Search will probably only be missed by very few users. We are, however, sad to see Google Notebook (one of our favorite Firefox addons), Jaiku, and Dodgeball go. These services had a lot of potential - and a lot of it remained untapped as Jaiku and Dodgeball remained almost unchanged after they were acquired by Google.

However, the current economic climate is probably making even a highly profitable company like Google focus on its core assets. None of the services that are being closed now had a lot of users and probably brought in very little to no revenue.

Also: Changes to Engineering and Recruiting

Shutting down these services was only part of Google's announcements today. In addition, Google announced that it is winding down almost all of its contracts with external contractors and vendors providing recruiting services to Google. Google will also cut 100 internal positions.

On the engineering side, Google is shutting down its offices in Austin, Texas; Trondheim, Norway; and Lulea, Sweden. The company is asking the employees who work there to move to Mountain View.

What About GrandCentral?

One service in Google's line-up we have always wondered about is GrandCentral - another service that was acquired before it even went public. Just like some of the services that Google is closing now, GrandCentral never came out of its invite-only mode after being acquired by Google. The fact that it is not being closed now, though, leads us to believe that Google is still having plans for this service.

Comment from chris on 2009-01-14

2009-01-15T04:00:14Z

Man I hope GrandCentral sticks around. That's an incredibly valuable service.

Comment from Jhangora on 2009-01-14

2009-01-15T04:06:09Z

I am not surprised by the closure of Jaiku. Twitter has inspired many clones and 2009 will see many of them closing down. My prediction is that Twitter will continue to be the biggest microblogging platform and would give other social media sites a run for their money.

Comment from Sherry Main on 2009-01-14

2009-01-15T04:09:52Z

I hope Google offers a way to migrate user's Google Notes content, as well as videos, to Google Docs and YouTube, respectively. It would be a bid disservice to Google Apps users if both applications close completely and content is lost.

Comment from Tom Brander on 2009-01-14

2009-01-15T04:13:50Z

I was really hoping to see notebook get more features like being able to e-mail to it and good import/ export features and maybe even separate passwords...I use the service a lot and would really miss it if it shut down. Great for keeping track of web site password combos among other things. I don't keep the critical ones there though! and of course Google keeps your bookmarks there!! and they provide a mobile version on the Gphone... don't get why it's having issues of non support...

Comment from Sean O'Steen on 2009-01-14

2009-01-15T04:26:15Z

Google, please keep Grand Central in active development. All you need is number porting and I will gladly move my home & office phone numbers over and cancel the last of my land lines! This is a service I will pay for! Please Please Please!

Comment from coldbrew on 2009-01-14

2009-01-15T06:02:06Z

You seem to have missed the fact that Jaiku's code base will be moved to GAE and made available on Google code.

Comment from Falaque on 2009-01-14

2009-01-15T06:28:02Z

Sad, Hopping something good in Notebook :(

Comment from BriteGuy on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T08:06:17Z

Well, if google is closing the notebook service, maybe it is time for me to offer a similar service, but fee based?

Comment from Łukasz on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T10:53:51Z

Maybe now Google buy Twitter?

Comment from lmjabreu on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T11:34:57Z

Jesus christ, Google Notebook on life support? Anyone wanna start a petition? lol

Comment from Darren Scott Monroe on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T12:34:27Z

OK guys break this down to me:
1. Does Google video closing mean that the search will go to youtube

2. The video sitemap I created for a video area on another site of ours is going to still work for Google search engines now?

Comment from kunalkant on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T12:44:38Z

We have similar tool name "Add to kreeo" instead of Google note.
Using this tool, you can share information, put in personal notebook as well as post as a blog
Check out,
www.kreeo.com.
A Knowledge networking and management platform.

Comment from Garry G on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T12:47:07Z

Need to rally Google to keep Notebook alive!

It's my favorite 'right click' tool... great for keeping clips from web... What are other options?

Garry G
Editor
The Energy Roadmap.com
http://www.theenergyroadmap.com

Comment from James Jones on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T13:44:44Z

Wow, that is amazing. Who would have thunk it!

www.anonweb.pro.tc

Comment from Nerissa Marbury on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T13:55:21Z

At first I panicked when I heard Google Notebook was being shut down, but was able to breathe again once I read it would remain functional even though additional development would cease.

Notebook is a Firefox add-on I discovered last fall. I use it A LOT! Try everyday. Google definitely has an unprocessed gem. I hope, sooner rather than later, Google will take it out of the freeze station and put it back into the incubator and help it grow.

Comment from Jonathan Patterson on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T14:09:37Z

I still don't have an invite for Grand Central.

What about 800-Goog-411?

Comment from Jason Kuhn on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T14:25:56Z

of course they'd keep around grand central... it might play a part with their new cell phone endeavors.

Comment from Zerolove on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T14:30:34Z

I wish they would actually do something with GrandCentral, like fix the import contacts that used to work and they took away. I hope they keep it, but fix some of the issues.

Zero

Comment from tech mogo on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T14:36:21Z

As long as my gmail and adsense stay in tact, i'll be fine.

Comment from Akashic Badger on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T14:53:58Z

Google Notebook is one of my most often used features!

Don't forsake Notebook!

Comment from workingwriter.myopenid.com on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T15:25:21Z

I'm sorry to see Notebook go, but I've been using Evernote (www.evernote.com) much more frequently. Excellent Firefox extension, good desktop client, reasonably cross-platform (Windows, Mac, iPhone/iPod Touch, Linux-under-Wine).

Comment from htnmmo on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T15:56:52Z

I figured they'd be dropping something. I was looking at Google's AdSense Revenues the other day and the portion they are getting has been getting smaller and smaller.

Last two reported quarters Google only kept around 11% of the revenue generated using AdSense. Almost half what it used to get. The percentage of revenues they keep is small now compared to what they make on other services.

Something's gotta give. Next week the annual report comes out and it should be interesting.

They're still in good shape I think, just not so many pet projects for a while.

Comment from fjpoblam on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T16:02:18Z

I depend upon Notebook as a reliable way to organize my Google Bookmarks. But I deduce from your comments that Notebook itself isn't going away, just further development; so I think I'm not scared, YET.

I'll really miss Product Search as a method of obtaining prices on products I'm about to buy; but, so it goes... There are other ways, more time-consuming of course, to look up prices.

Comment from Chris Hanson on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T16:16:38Z

@fjpoblam: Product Search (nee Froogle) is not the same as Catalog Search. Catalog is a much more limited tool.

Notebook sounds cool, but I never used it. The one I wonder about is Google Video. last I knew YouTube still had limits on how long of a clip you could upload.

http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=55743
"http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=55743"

Google Video permitted videos longer than 10 minutes, and I made use of this for longer clips that were more content than just "ZOMG! Neighbor fell off his roof and lost his pants!"

Comment from mdjohnson1 on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T16:28:07Z

No ... not notebook. It held SO much potential.

Join me if you agree:
http://savenotebook.blogspot.com/

Comment from Arion on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T16:28:57Z

Umm, Grand Central is not invite only, it just takes a while to get accepted.

Comment from BAF on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T17:37:06Z

Grand Central is no longer accepting new users. They closed it a while ago. Beforehand it was indeed invite only.

Comment from Chris Kenworthy on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T18:04:54Z

GrandCentral appears to be part of a bigger plan for conversion tracking by Audio, Print, and TV advertisements within AdWords. There is a new (??) feature that lets you choose a phone number for your advertisements and track the phone calls as "goals" or "conversions" within AdWords.

I think the GrandCentral acquisition was always meant more for the advertiser than the general user. There's far more money to be made by letting companies do PPC advertising where the "click" is a phone call :-)

GrandCentral may stop offering services for general users, but I think you'll see a major increase in it's usage on the AdWords side of the house.

Comment from jive on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T18:12:06Z

Google Notebook was one of my favorite apps on Google. It's a shame more people dont use it, or it might of not gotten axed.

Comment from quanta on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T18:13:03Z

The Dodgeball announcement is especially sad. The Dodgeball founders left Google back in 2007 because they were frustrated from what they saw was a total lack of interest or investment in their work. Not sure why a company would enthusiastically pay millions for IP just to let it stagnate for years.

It must be bittersweet for them to hear this, especially since Dodgeball basically pioneered the current mobile social networking phenomenon.

Comment from Ted on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T18:35:21Z

Forget Grand Central - use RingCentral.com. it's up, running and works great.

Comment from Joe on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T19:29:06Z

No further development for Notebook is really sad. Now, its even moresad to see a company like Google accquiring IP from other companies just to let it die. If this was Microsoft, a lot of negative replies against the company would be posted.

Comment from Jason Bartholme on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T19:36:45Z

Please, not Notebook. I have so much in there, that I use almost daily. I agree they should offer some kind of migration tool to get content out of there and into a similar service.

Comment from Jeteye on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T19:38:13Z

A great alternative to Google Notebook is Jeteye.com. Plugins available for both Firefox and IE 6/7/8.

Saving items is a simple drag/drop operation. Collections are called Jetpaks, each with their own URL - and can be set as public or private.

We always love feedback. Give it a try!

The Jeteye Team
www.jeteye.com

Comment from Travis McCrea on 2009-01-15

2009-01-15T21:03:11Z

@Chris Hanson

Youtube has expanded to 1GB and I think an hour or 2 long they are now making it so you can run full lenght movies

Comment from James on 2009-01-15

2009-01-16T01:00:41Z

Only way I think GrandCentral would get canned is at the same time as Android

Comment from Ben on 2009-01-15

2009-01-16T01:14:40Z

I do hope they keep GrandCentral around. I tried to create a "VoiceMail" label the other day and I got the following error message: "System specific names are not allowed. Please try another name:". I dont know if this is something they use internally or if it is held for a future product such as GrandCentral. I hope they use it for GC!

Comment from Peter on 2009-01-15

2009-01-16T04:47:10Z

I'm glad I moved to evernote.com

Google Notebook never really felt right... I wish they spent some time perfecting it. It had potential.

Comment from guidewire on 2009-01-15

2009-01-16T06:13:11Z

I'm very sad to hear about google notebook too. I have a weird tech love for it and I too use it daily. A freeform information scratch pad that you could search through easily was very powerful. I've had many forgetful moments aided by a quick search through my notes. Suppose we can't depend on anything.

Comment from Paul on 2009-01-15

2009-01-16T06:26:52Z

Google please save GrandCentral. I use it and would gladly pay for it.

Comment from Stephen on 2009-01-15

2009-01-16T06:31:58Z

I was always disappointed that when Google bought YouTube, they used the youtube interface not the google video one, as I prefer the cleaner, more "googley" look to the messy cluttered youtube one.

Its ridiculous thats they would buy something and then kill it. I hope they will stop that.

Comment from carol on 2009-01-16

2009-01-16T08:54:20Z

and along with it the increase of unemployment stats!!!!
i hope the ppl in the back end can find something useful here...

http://www.jobstaxi.com

Comment from lucy on 2009-01-16

2009-01-16T15:49:20Z

I love Notebook, too. But don't trust that Google will provide a seamless migration to Docs. Back up your Notebooks now.

I had a JotSpot wiki. When Google bought JotSpot, I tried repeatedly to access my data and couldn't. Finally, over a year later, I was informed apologetically by Google that my data was among those lost during the migration.

Anything you do online should have an offline backup.

Comment from William Argatto on 2009-01-16

2009-01-16T18:10:11Z

Sorry to see these services go. Grandcentral was a great little service, and I'd recommended it to all sorts of people back in the day. Now the only people offering personal 800 numbers are paid services, like the hosted PBX market (Fancy virtual switchboards. Run a search for 'hosted PBX' if you don't know about 'em).
Then you have to give up Jaiku and settle on Twitter, and of course all hope of fancy google gadgets. But everybody's tightening their belts these days. We might see this stuff pick up again after Q3 this year.

Comment from venkat on 2009-01-16

2009-01-16T19:35:10Z

Web Applications by their very nature exist only if the company that runs the server wants them to. They can disappear overnight. They can disappear if the accounts start showing a little bit red. They can disappear if a competitor appears or the signup rates decreases. They can disappear if the economy starts heading south. This is the reason Web apps are particularly insidious. Application users can never be sure their application will still be there tomorrow when they login. I am little surprised why google is not getting flak for this action from the user community.
If google can do this what about other web 2.0 companies with less cash in hand? In essence users are getting the shaft for trusting google.

Comment from Chris Pratt on 2009-01-16

2009-01-16T21:18:21Z

I liked Google Notebook, but stopped using it long ago. The reason being most likely the same reason Google is giving it the axe: it's too far behind the curve of other similar services.

I've been using Evernote without qualms or regrets. It beats the pants off Google Notebook in features alone, not to mention the insane level of portability of your data it gives you. Native apps for both Windows and Mac OSX, native mobile apps (it's a thing of beauty on the iPhone) and web-based access for any other scenario.

Comment from Paul on 2009-01-16

2009-01-17T01:47:32Z

Thank god Grand Central isn't closing

Comment from James on 2009-01-20

2009-01-21T02:48:08Z

gutted that google notebook is ceasing development. gonna have to find a substitute. any suggestions?

Comment from James on 2009-01-20

2009-01-21T03:00:40Z

okay i actually read a couple of posts and im gonna give evernote a try. its nice to have all your stuff together with google though, i use gmail, reader, notebook etc.. gotta love google!

Comment from Jilan Wagdy on 2009-01-21

2009-01-21T10:13:31Z

Notebook NO WAY, I really gonna miss it , it's agreat tool , i'm using it instead of Bookmarks sites , yet i use a few of them , but google Note book really give me all i need .
I can't think right now for an alternative.
This is a real loss

Comment from dccrowley on 2009-01-21

2009-01-21T17:42:05Z

zoho has a notebook and a tool to export you google notes before it goes down the drain. I never use zoho, so I don't know how good it is. I signed up today. I just can't ignore these smart guys any more.

Comment from Dane Wayne on 2009-01-24

2009-01-24T17:33:43Z

I too hope GrandCentral continues to function for the general user.

I was fortunate enough to get a few numbers in the cities I have customers and thus I was able to eliminate the obscenely high cost of the toll-free number my small business had.

If they close it down or get too cost prohibative, I'll deal with that by no longer using it.

In todays economy adapting to companies giving you services and features and then taking them away is just the way it is these days.

In the end, the business that do those things will suffer becase we the consumer are getting very, very, selective and before the recession it was too many dollars going after too little retail and now it is too much retail going after too few dollars.

Comment from togden on 2009-02-06

2009-02-06T15:58:34Z

Another endorsement for Evernote as a better option than Notebook ever was. They've also introduced a Google Notebook importer.