If you are a loyal user of Google Reader, AKA – Google RSS, it’s time to say goodbye! The Internet giant is planning to shut down the service starting July 1,2013.
According to Google’s blog, the service that was firstly launched back in 2005 in an effort to make it easy for people to discover and keep tabs on their favorite websites, Google RSS had suffered a massive decline in use over the years, which caused Google to terminate the service. Google is offering its users and developers who are still interested in RSS alternatives to export their data, including their subscriptions, with Google Takeout so they will not lose their data.
Since the announcement, many users have expressed shock and anger at Google’s strange decision. The service has many loyal readers, who do not understand Google’s decision to shut it down. Back in 2011, Google changed the design of Google Reader and removed some important features, including the option to share posts with other users of the service which made a lot of users angry as well, so imagine the impact of shutting the whole operation down.
The Google reader is, for me personally, a great way to catch up with cool stuff and news around the web. I hope that Google hasn’t said the last word yet and is planing to launch a new alternative. Meanwhile, a petition against the closure of the service was opened by some users, so don’t give up yet! The petition is addressed to the heads of Google in order to prevent the closing of Google Reader. Google, known for their support of open source projects can also open their service’s code and allow outside companies to use and build on the new alternative.
