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Google Technology

Google Killing Off Mini, Video, and iGoogle 329

New submitter Trashcan Romeo writes "Three years ago, it accounted for 20% of all visits to Google's home page. Two years ago, Lifehacker readers voted it the best start-page service. Today it was announced that iGoogle will be retired — or in the company's parlance, 'spring cleaned' — on November 1, 2013." Google Video is also getting the axe this summer. It hasn't accepted new videos since 2009, and all of the old ones will be migrated to YouTube. The company is also getting rid of Google Mini, Talk Chatback, and their Symbian search app.
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Google Killing Off Mini, Video, and iGoogle

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  • Really. I pinged a friend who uses iGoogle, and he's just like "Meh".

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by skipkent ( 1510 )

      Didn't work/look right with noscript anyway.

      • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:40PM (#40537315)

        A tool built almost entirely in javascript doesn't work with a JAVASCRIPT BLOCKER?!?!?!?!?11111111

        That's just crazy talk.

        But seriously, expecting to browse the modern web with noscript enabled just isn't sane.

        • Sane? Modern Web?

          Insensitive clod! this is /.

        • Comment removed based on user account deletion
          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Anonymous Coward

            I ain't a fuckin' grandma. Using Noscript and Adblock Plus. I guarantee my web experience is more pleasant than yours. Web pages don't start playing video or audio, shit doesn't start moving of its own accord. No ads, no script driven bullshit unless I allow it.

            Anyone who just lets web sites do whatever the fuck they want in their browser must have a few screws loose.

            • I only have AdBlock Plus, and I also do not have video and audio starting or stuff moving around. I guess it's the kind of site you go to...

            • by wmbetts ( 1306001 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @05:10AM (#40539575)

              I have no problem with viewing the occasional ad. They help fund websites I enjoy including slashdot. I have the option to turn off ads here, but I don't. Saying your web experience is better than someone who doesn't subscribe to your philosophy of "all ads are bad and completely ruin the entire web" is silly. The phrase "a good web experience" is subjective. What I find good you might find bad and vice versa. If a website has annoying video and/or audio ads I just won't go to the site. If it weren't for marketing I would have missed out on some interesting things. I do absolutely need those things? No, but that doesn't change the fact I like them.

            • by pandronic ( 1275276 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @07:49AM (#40540281)

              I can't imagine a web with no Javascript. It's like using half of the web. I'm a webdeveloper and website owner and I really, really, really don't care about people who don't have Javascript enabled. I'd rather give the rest a great experience and I don't want to spend time and resources to provide a fallback.

              Also advertising supports many of my favorite sites. I probably wouldn't be paying for a subscription, but I think it's common courtesy to give website owners the chance to make a buck for their hard work. I have Adblock installed and I only use it when ads are too annoying that they disturb my browsing experience.

              • A case in point of an ad that pisses me off: I've been on Ryanairs website the last couple days planning a trip. They have pop unders that load when you click the "book now" button. For some reason my browser freezes for several seconds when I click the button the first time. Since I'm using a crappy wireless connection I'm pirating from my girlfriend's neighbor I'm never sure if it is just the site being slow, the connection or the stupid pop under delay.

                That is another instant killer for me people with go

              • by AngryDeuce ( 2205124 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @09:33AM (#40540963)

                I can't imagine a web with no Javascript. It's like using half of the web.

                Yeah, which is usually the half of the web you actually want. You know, as opposed to all the other bullshit tracking, 'traffic monetizing' scripts that are all over the corporate web now...

                To give an example, my former local news site of choice, Madison.com, had a complete redesign a few weeks ago that they talked up. "Oh, it's going to be so much better and more modern, the comments will be much better, etc"...what they neglected to tell everyone was that they were adding a shit-load more tracking services (which, thanks to NoScript, I was able to block) and on top of that, they threw up a fucking paywall, because you know all the tracking cookies and Facebook Connect bullshit they are earning money on, not to mention the ad impressions, and not to mention the shady shit they pulled on their iOS/Android app where they place their in-app ads right next to often used links, like the link to post a comment, thus capturing probably thousands of accidental ad-clicks they shouldn't have, all that wasn't enough, now they have to limit you to 5 articles a month (unless you subscribe to the local paper...yeah, right, who the hell pays money for a fucking newspaper these days?). Well, unless you have NoScript running, then it doesn't work and you can look at all the articles you want, just like everyone could before the all those "improvements".

                I will grant that Javascript adds a lot of functionality to the web, but it's abuse has made me treat all JS as suspect until I can ascertain if it's implementation is for functionality or turning me into a product to be sold. I see no moral dilemmas whatsoever with using NoScript to block all of that bullshit and selectively allow what I actually feel are worth the compute cycles to be run on my machine, because it's still my fucking machine. If they don't like it, that's fine, they can do like a lot of sites are doing these days and basically have their site return blank pages if JS is disabled...but in truth, when they get that ridiculous with the shit, I just stop using their site and find another one. It's not like there aren't alternatives out there, after all.

                If anyone should be blamed for the fact that Adblock is becoming ubiquitous these days (and NoScript is starting to, as well, something I encourage as much as possible), it's the people that abused internet ads (and later JS) in the first place. If I hadn't have finally gotten sick and goddamned tired of click-jacking "punch the monkey" horseshit I likely never would have added Adblock and NoScript to my browser in the first place.

              • by RandomFactor ( 22447 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @02:57PM (#40543655)

                a webdeveloper and website owner and I really, really, really don't care about people who don't have Javascript enabled. I'd rather give the rest a great experience and I don't want to spend time and resources to provide a fallback.

                Off mark.

                Railing against folks because they value the security of their system is angsty and irrational.

                You don't need to provide a fallback for non script enabled visitors (though it is appreciated when I site does provide non JS fallback), you simply need to allow them their broken access, they are fully aware that most sites are broken in various ways without scripting and willl turn JS on granularly as needed.

                You don't spend resources, they don't get pwned. Everyone happy.

          • by Fallingwater ( 1465567 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @07:42AM (#40540243)

            I use noscript, but reversed - it's set to enable everything by default, and I disable selectively stuff that annoys me. This way I avoid all the really bad stuff (like autoplaying anything) without being left with a half-broken internet.

    • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:19PM (#40537157)
      Oh yeah? I Googled a friend who uses ping, and he's just like "hem".
      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by Brucelet ( 1857158 )
        I wanted to ping a friend who uses bing to see if there was a microsoft alternative, but I couldn't remember how. I had to bing my friend who knows ping so I could ask him for help.
    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      You're right, that's the real indicator.

      I pinged a friend who uses the internet, and he said "meh". Perhaps we should just shut it all down.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by baker_tony ( 621742 )

      Good sample size you've got going on there for your analysis.

    • iDon't know, maybe Google's simply replaced the i with a +?
    • by PopeRatzo ( 965947 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @11:56PM (#40537835) Journal

      Really. I pinged a friend who uses iGoogle, and he's just like "Meh".

      That's strange, when I pinged him he said, "bytes=32 time 3ms TTL=53".

    • by wmac1 ( 2478314 )

      I come to Slashdot from iGoogle RSS reader almost 90% of the time. I have been using iGoogle as my RSS reader since almost 2007.

      It is a pity but I think I will be able to find numerous alternatives.

  • I've been using iGoogle since '05, I feel like this is a loss but I'm already moving over to Google Reader and getting used to the new interface... at first I'm "Meh" about Reader, but I dont hate it, yet.
    • by skipkent ( 1510 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:18PM (#40537151)

      So you're snowgirl's "Meh" friend!

    • by JoeMerchant ( 803320 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:40PM (#40537319)

      iGoogle and my.yahoo are the primary reasons I "use" both services.

      I suppose they have something new, but "spring cleaning" my iGoogle may just leave me sticking with my.yahoo

      Some of us are happy with the old interfaces - now: GET OFF OUR LAWN!

      • by no1nose ( 993082 )

        I'm in the same boat here. iGoogle.com and my.yahoo.com are my two main homepages when I launch Chrome. I use their bookmarks features quite often. Last year Yahoo! messed with the bookmarks on my.yahoo.com and tried to force everyone to use the Yahoo Toolbar to manage them. I nearly left Yahoo, but eventually they gave into their user requests and allowed them to be managed from my.yahoo.com again.

    • by macshit ( 157376 ) <snogglethorpe@NOsPAM.gmail.com> on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @11:36PM (#40537687) Homepage

      Google Reader's a fine app for [what seems to be] its intended purpose—but it's nothing like iGoogle, and doesn't do a great job of replacing it in my opinion. I use both regularly, and will be sad when either goes away.

      This does seem a pretty weird decision. The reasoning they give (basically "lol, phones and device-/browser-specific apps are the future!") is kind of dubious, and seems strangely at odds with Google's general push for device-/browser-independent apps.

      I wonder if this is the result of some internal political/turf/funding war at Google...?

      [My guess: The Google+ team is politically very powerful, and they want to push everybody to use that instead. Never mind that Google+ (which I like) is extremely different, and not a particularly good replacement for iGoogle...]

    • i've always preferred google reader to igoogle and any other feed reader out there (online or offline). i'm really scared that google will kill it too i sometime. seems like they are going to reduce everything to g+.
      is there any other feed reader that is as good?

      • by D'Sphitz ( 699604 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @01:54AM (#40538599) Journal

        i'm really scared that google will kill it too i sometime

        They are doing a pretty good job of training millions of people not to get too attached to anything they make, because it will likely disappear someday with no justification (along with your data).

        • by SnowZero ( 92219 )

          Well, Google does give plenty of notification that a service is getting retired and lets you download all your data, so the data's only gone if you are too lazy to download it with 6+ months of notice.

        • by guises ( 2423402 )
          Come on now, you can't start complaining that Google isn't retaining enough of your data. They might get the wrong idea.
    • by Endovior ( 2450520 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @12:00AM (#40537861)
      Hrm. I've been using iGoogle as a homepage for years, now... nice convenient place to simultaneously check email and news before doing whatever else I'm doing with my browser at the moment. Heck, I mainly check /. based on the iGoogle widget; it's a convenient way to promote things to my attention. In contrast, I rather dislike the Reader interface; if iGoogle is indeed axed, I probably won't start using Reader afterwards (or at all, probably)... they do different things in different ways, and Google really doesn't have a good replacement on hand.
      • by legont ( 2570191 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @12:38AM (#40538149)
        Second that. It's my homepage for years. Somebody's making a very bad decision.
        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by ender- ( 42944 )

          Thirded. I switched away from my.yahoo.com when iGoogle first came out and I've been using it ever since. I've got it set up just perfectly as I like it. I'm going to be extremely disappointed if/when they retire iGoogle. :(

          • by Chrisq ( 894406 )
            Me fourthed. They have nice widgets all in one place - email, feeds, news, etc - and I can see the same thing at work, home, friends PCs etc.
            • by Inda ( 580031 )
              Me...

              I've joined the conversation late, as usual, and most people are saying the same thing: I use it for email subjects, which Google only updated recently, RSS feeds, Reader, Latitude, Calendar (very important to me), English Premier League table, Twitter,...

              C'mon Google. Get a clue. 5, 6 years of use from power users should tell you something. It's a highly used tool.

              Alternatives? 10 tabs on Firefox startup doesn't sound like something I want to do.

              Hopefully they'll make a replacement.
      • Agreed. Gmail, Calendar, Documents, Chat, Quick Notes all on a single landing page. It was quite convenient.

      • by David_Hart ( 1184661 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @02:09AM (#40538673)

        iGoogle has been my home page for years as well. I check my email, news, sports, slashdot, woot, weather, traffic, movie times, network tools, etc. all in one interface. I'm going to be very sad to see it go. Those that never used it missed out on a good app that could be used to consolidate a bunch of information in one place.

        Does anyone have any suggestions as to what might be a good replacement?

  • Archive Team again? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by tepples ( 727027 ) <tepplesNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:21PM (#40537173) Homepage Journal
    All videos on Google Video will become private YouTube videos. Will this see the return of the Google Video archiving effort by Archive Team [archiveteam.org], covered in a previous Slashdot story [slashdot.org]?
  • by vmxeo ( 173325 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:23PM (#40537197) Homepage Journal

    Reading over the sunset annoucement, I don't think they realize how people really use it. It's not a mobile service, and it isn't simply a redundant link to stuff, it's a dashboard of what I'm interested in and a portal to all of Google's other services. It's also not just a homepage, it's the page I have open on my desktop all the time.

    • by Manfre ( 631065 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:36PM (#40537283) Homepage Journal

      iGoogle is the only browser homepages I've used in the past ~5 years. I guess it's time to switch back to about:blank or roll my own replacement for iGoogle.

      • Agree 100%.

        This is my homepage. Able to put my own links and have a google bar at the top just makes it even more handy.

        I'll probably use it until the last day and then look for a similar service.

    • Widgets?

      OS X, Windows 8, KDE, Android and others allow you to embed HTML snippets on the desktop.

      Rather than load a web browser, one can "mashup" HTML widgets on your home screen directly.

      • by SJHillman ( 1966756 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:41PM (#40537325)

        I've done the whole widgets on the desktop thing, it was cool for a while but ultimately I found that I liked it in a web page better. Seems to be less buggy too.

        • by SQLGuru ( 980662 )

          Also, when it's widgets on the desktop you have to minimize your work to see it. With an open browser window, you can either switch to the browser (which you frequently do anyway) or [at least in Windows] hover over the browser icon in the taskbar to get a smaller preview window which is generally enough to see if there's a new mail message.

      • And then you change PCs, and got to do it all over again. Or you switch to your Tablet, laptop, netbook.. ditto.

        A dashboard webpage is really the most portable way to do that. Looking for a replacement as we speak...

        • by rusl ( 1255318 )

          This reminds me of the ridiculous article about CLI being obsolete. Progress goes backwards sometimes because people who get enticed by shiny things are in charge of making all the computers and don't know that they are de-evolving instead of progress.

    • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:45PM (#40537355)

      Same here. According to their "What's happening to iGoogle?" help page, they say "With modern apps that run on platforms like Chrome and Android, the need for something like iGoogle has eroded over time".

      That's certainly not true for me, and I'm both a Chrome and Android user. They're great, but Android is not the desktop, and Chrome is not the only browser on the the only computer I use. iGoogle is good for me because it's cross-platform, highly flexible, and feature full. That's why it's so key to my everyday workflow, and that's why this is a seriously misguided choice on Google's part.

    • by lehphyro ( 1465921 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:49PM (#40537377)
      You may want to give Netvibes (http://www.netvibes.com/) a try.
      • I switched to Netvibes a few years ago, when Google added the unremoveable sidebar (which was added at the behest of gadget developers, apparently the only users of iGoogle that matter). It has served me pretty well, though I still miss having a Google search bar with full functionality.

    • MyYahoo (Score:4, Insightful)

      by MrEricSir ( 398214 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @11:01PM (#40537469) Homepage

      How about MyYahoo? iGoogle was a knockoff of 90's "personalized web portals" anyway, so why not go with the original?

    • by cluening ( 6626 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @11:30PM (#40537657) Homepage

      ... it's also not that hard to write your own. There are plenty of perl/python/whatever rss libraries out there to do all of the hard work, and then you just need to spend some time fiddling with CSS to make it look pretty. Here's what I created about 10 years ago, before all of these other things existed:

      http://www.wirelesscouch.net/cgi-bin/headlines/headlines.pl [wirelesscouch.net]

      (Well, maybe those other things existed. I certainly didn't know about them though.)

    • Totally agree. I've got mail, reader, calendar, to-do on there. Already looking for a replacement, and since this sucks majorly, i'm looking to replace the google services (reader in particular) the i was using iGoogle as a front for.

      That'll teach me to put all my eggs in on basket. Anyone got spare baskets ?

  • by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:24PM (#40537201)

    I've used my iGoogle page as my homepage for however long it's been around - five years? six? It'll suck having this go away, but it's been obvious for a while that Google's all about killing off anything they offer that they've been unable to monetize.

    What I find funny is their suggestion that, as an "alternative" to iGoogle, we should either move to using Google Play (um, what?) or start using Chrome as a browser. Yeah, how are those iGoogle replacements again?

    I'll find a non-Google replacement, just like I have whenever they've discontinued their other offerings I liked.

    • Netvibes is a much better dash board than iGoogle ever was.

    • Chrome's extensions or plug-ins or whatever they call them can replicate most of the functionalities of the widgets. I only use Chrome for it's various widget/app-like extensions and Netflix, never use it to surf the web.

    • I used iGoogle years ago, primarily for the RSS feeds. If you have access to a web server, there are a number of ways to set something similar up yourself. I've done it at me.seandiggity.com [seandiggity.com] using WordPress + Aggregator theme + some extra plugins. There are definitely simpler ways, but I like the flexibility of WordPress's widgets.
      • by EvilSS ( 557649 )
        I'm leaning this way. If Google is killing iGoogle, one would assume its for declining use and that does not bode well for NetVibes. And my.yahoo is hideous. I'm not going there. Being in the cloud is great until Google decides to retire your favorite cloud.
  • by Black Parrot ( 19622 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:25PM (#40537209)

    I'd keep that.

  • by Dcnjoe60 ( 682885 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:35PM (#40537277)

    Cloud computing is always heavily promoted and it does have many advantages. However, it also has one significant disadvantage -- your computing environment is at the whim of whomever is providing said service. If you come to depend on a service and the provider cancels it, you can try and find a substitute or simply accept that you are out of luck.

    These services that Google is dropping, are not critical, but they could have been. Not every cloud has a silver lining, or even a chrome one.

  • by snsh ( 968808 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:53PM (#40537413)

    Google started killing off the mini years ago when they stopped releasing software updates for it, and stopped updating the hardware.

    It's kind of disingenuous for Google to say the mini has an 'adequate' replacement. Google Custom Search doesn't give the admin nearly enough control. There's no way to guarantee all your pages will get included in the index, even if you're on a paid subscription. No keymatch functionality, no regex exclusions, no freshness tuning. And the Google Search Appliance costs over 10x the cost of the mini (starts at $45k instead of $3k). It's hard to call that a suitable replacement.

    The problem with the mini is that Google couldn't make enough money on it. It basically started out as a min-GSA, with less beefy hardware and a lower license page limit. Customers would buy it, deploy it, and forget about it. It worked great. Google thought that customers would migrate from the mini to the GSA, but I think what happened is once they had the mini they stayed with the mini for their public website, and many never saw the need to spend $$$$$ to upgrade to the GSA for enterprise search.

    At one point a few years ago, Google released a "VM edition" of the mini/gsa for development use. They quickly realized that VM was the wrong way to go because without the pretty hardware and cables they couldn't justify the cost of the GSA to customers, so they quietly cancelled the VM and all mention of it. Wish I had kept the copy I had downloaded.

  • Ruined my day (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Teknikal69 ( 1769274 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:54PM (#40537423)
    First thing I saw when I turned on my PC and I actually came from the Slashdot iGoogle widget.

    I've been using iGoogle since it first launched and it's really the only reason I use many of Googles services and also the only reason I bother logging into Google at all.

    Very disappointed in honesty I think I'll probably end up giving Bing a try simply because I can't think of anything else to replace it with.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by cis4 ( 2565359 )
      The Slashdot widget on iGoogle is the only reason I come here. Here's to hoping someone will make a replacement.
  • by glebovitz ( 202712 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @10:56PM (#40537431) Journal

    I use iGoogle. I will miss it. I hope they will have something to replace it. IMHO, Google services always have the feel of something half finished. They are kinda like the anti Apple.

  • Dammit!!!! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Yosho-sama ( 800703 ) <Yosho DOT NIN AT gmail DOT com> on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @11:14PM (#40537571)
    I use iGoogle as my landing page. I have my email, slashdot, new york times, BBC, the weather, a sunlight map, wikipedia, and a pet hamster all on the same page. Where else am I going to get all that the second I open firefox?
  • by C_Kode ( 102755 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @11:16PM (#40537587) Journal

    iGoogle. Having all of your RSS feeds, your email feed, calendar, TODO list among a few other things. It is very useful and effective in what it does.

    There are several websites that post interesting items, but not enough to visit them every day. The RSS feed makes it were you don't have too. Combining it all with stuff you do use every day (email, calendar, todo list) makes iGoogle extremely useful.

    What I find is most people have tools at their finger tips that they have no idea how useful that tool actually is and therefore don't end up using it.

    iGoogle is useful, but like Google+ most people have no idea how to actually use it. (at least half-intelligent people are actually figuring out how to use Google+, that just doesn't seem to be the case for iGoogle)

    That ignorance is a loss for us all.

    • by Sturm ( 914 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @12:55AM (#40538235) Journal

      As a matter of fact, the tech site forums are loaded with people bemoaning the demise of iGoogle.
      One of the things that Google is really good at is analytics. They KNOW how many people are using iGoogle.
      That leads me to believe they are shuttering it not because of lack of use but rather because TOO many people are using it. They obviously believe they are losing "clicks" or as some others have stated, they are trying to herd us into using some bastardized version of Google+ they have yet to release.
      Google has been pretty good about living up to the whole, "Do no evil" thing so I'm hoping we all wake up in a few days/week and read on our shiny new netvibes.com homepage that Google has changed their mind about dropping iGoogle.
      Dropping iGoogle might not be totally "evil" but it will definitely make me think twice before using any other new Google-branded services they release in the future.

  • by paleo2002 ( 1079697 ) on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @11:21PM (#40537615)
    I've been using iGoogle as my home page forever. Considering the broad range of services Google provides now - email, chat, voice services, etc. - you'd think they'd want to provide a central hub. I've got mine set up for some basic news headlines with sports, hollywood, and Fox filtered out. I also use it for local weather, Google Chat, and to manage account settings. I think I'll miss the news aggregator function the most.

    Any suggestions for a good generalized news aggregator? Something that will draw from a variety of sources and can be customized for topic preferences.
  • I'll miss spring scape, watching frog & ladybug go through their day was great.

  • Now what will my Mom use for a homepage? It checks her gmail, stocks, weather, and offers a translator. What will she do now? TELL ME GOOGLE, WHAT WILL SHE DO NOW?!
  • Foolish (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Charliemopps ( 1157495 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @12:01AM (#40537867)
    I've used iGoogle for years because I spend most of my day in a corporate environment. It put everything I needed on 1 page... Google... which I was almost expected to visit regularly. So I'd pop it up, I could see my email, the temperature, CNN news, and even slashdot. In fact, I read this story first through iGoogle. Can I use Chrome and its extensions to do this like they suggest? No... my web client is fixed, and I can't add extensions at work. The idea that we're moving away from web based apps to browser based, local plugins it insane to me. What is this? 1999?
  • by seandiggity ( 992657 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @12:10AM (#40537941) Homepage
    If you have access to a web server, there are a number of ways to set something similar up yourself. I've done it at seandiggity.com [seandiggity.com] using WordPress + Aggregator theme + some extra plugins. There are definitely simpler ways, but I like the flexibility of WordPress's widgets.
  • by dhaines ( 323241 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @12:58AM (#40538261)

    You seem really withdrawn and distant. It's that gossipy jerk Facebook, isn't it?

    Our iGoogle times were great. Remember how we discovered new things with Reader, how we built our lives around Calendar? And wow, you were really good in search!

    But you've changed, Google. I don't mind that you're heavier, but this diet is like cutting off your legs to lose weight. And frankly, you're kind of clingy.

    So let's just be friends. I'll still see ya around Maps, and maybe we can catch an image search sometime. Your tracking will always be with me.

    Sorry I missed you at Plus, I came by but no one was there.

  • Nervous about email (Score:4, Informative)

    by Geeky ( 90998 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @06:20AM (#40539861)

    It's things like this that make me - and possibly small businesses - nervous about email and the other google apps products

    While it's unlikely they'd ever kill gmail, it makes it harder to make a case to bet the farm on google. Shame there's no really viable alternative to email with a half decent web interface (animated ads flickering in the corner of my eye annoy the hell out of me and I don't want to jump through ad-blocking hoops on every PC I ever use).

    So iGoogle might not be a big product, but it's visible enough (unlike maybe some of the smaller products they've killed) to make potential users pause.

  • by montyzooooma ( 853414 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @06:59AM (#40540005)
    Just wondering if getting rid of iGoogle, which I was never a fan of but which didn't seem heinous either, has anything to do with the "Google Now" app on Android.
  • by Chrisq ( 894406 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2012 @09:14AM (#40540835)
    Netvibes is blocked by my employer's firewall ;-(

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