Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
GOOGLE HAS ANNOUNCED it is to shut down its Google Reader service because of declining interest in the RSS feed.
The product has been in operation since 2005 and allowed people to discover and keep tabs on their favourite websites.
Google acknowledged there was “a loyal following” for the service but said “over the years usage has declined” and on July 1, 2013 Google Reader will be retired.
In addition to closing Reader, from next week on they are also ending support for the Google Voice App for Blackberry and have recommend use of HTML5 app, which Google says is more secure and easier for them “to keep up to date”.
Other services to close include Google Building Maker and Google Cloud Connect. They are also deprecating their Search API for Shopping, which has enabled developers to create shopping apps based on Google’s Product Search data and they will no longer sell or provide updates for Snapseed Desktop for Macintosh and Windows.
It comes following a number of closure announcements during a “second spring cleaning” by Google. It brings the total number of features or services closed to 70 since their spring cleaning began in 2011.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Damn, I use Reader all the time. It’s great for keeping up with my RSS feeds on phone and computers. Any good alternatives?
Same here. I don’t think there is any alternative with such a good web version and most importantly an open API with an ecosystem of news reading applications which can all be synchronised. But that last point is probably the main reason they are pulling the plug: it is costing money to maintain the service but they are not making anything with it as there are no ads on the web version and many people are using third party software to access their account anyway.
It is probably true when they say usage is declining, but there are still A LOT of people using it, especially amongst heavy Internet users who are reading news from a large number of websites and people in the media and Internet business.
These groups are pretty vocal and have already raised concerns to Google.
Lifehacker are due to do a list of alternative readers. Will keep an eye out and will post here again.
There is a list of altenatives here: http://mashable.com/2013/03/14/google-reader-alternatives/
I have never used it, but Feedly looks like it might be a good one.
Feedly is working great for me so far. Seamless transition.
Try http://www.netvibes.com
It’s a pity I stopped using it for Google Reader, just to come back to it now.
Alternatives? Trying liferea and newsbeuter at the moment and there are a rake of others and that’s just the local apps; there are many more web-based apps. There’s a discussion in the Development forum on boards.ie about it:
I blame the government!
No, it was the Catholic Church, I tell you. The Catholic Church!
They are working together!!
I live in Reader. It’s how I use the Internet.
Newsblur looks promising, but the site is getting hammered with traffic at the moment.
Feedly, Pulse, Taptu are good.
Pulse and StumbleUpon are ruining my life.
They keep calling out to me!
Damn. It was a superb service, and one amazing feature that no other RSS readers have as far as I can see is that Google Reader was also integrated with Google Translate.
This meant you could follow and read updates from blogs/mags/newspapers/journals in many other languages and they’d be translated in the RSS feed in the “All items” view.
They are retiring iGoogle as well, in November. I always use that. It’s my default browser page. Thanks for the suggestions of alternatives!
Just switched to Feedly this week and so far so good. Nice layout too.
Jebus. I live in Reader.
I bet they are killing Feedburner as well.
Bloglines or netvibes are good alternatives.
have your say