Has Google Shut Down SMS Search? 118
hypnosec writes "Users in the US are reporting that Google has allegedly shut down its SMS Search service without any official announcement or notification. According to initial reports users are getting a 'SMS search has been shutdown' message. Navigating to the official Google Mobile website and clicking on SMS Search yields nothing but 404 – Page not found error."
Sucks (Score:5, Informative)
Sucks since I don't have a data plan... But an (very short) explanation is here http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/websearch/yKG7BGro7QQ/ntAXQWWKj70J [google.com]
Re:Sucks (Score:5, Insightful)
It's quite disappointing given they already abolished the Google 411 service. There are still plenty of folk without data plans, or who find themselves roaming where they have minutes and text messages but no data.
I understand Google's desire to move the world forward, but often these interfaces were useful, and sometimes they were they only interface available.
The idea that this is down to focusing on other products really doesn't wash. The products were both stable and likely taking almost no resources to maintain. If they did need anything to support them, I doubt it would be beyond the capability of an intern.
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if you were still relying on google 411 when it shut down and today still can't figure out what to do with it, then you have problems well beyond google 411.
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Your sentance doesn't really make sense, so I'm not sure what you mean.
If someone doesn't have a data plan, or is romaing and doesn't have access to data, what are your suggestions? There are other 411 services, but I haven't found one as fast or as accurate as Google's was.
Similarly, the SMS service provided an alternative way to conduct a simple google search. It wasn't a substitute for Google, but if you needed a number for the hotel you're staying at, or for the restaurant you're meeting someone at, it
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again.
you still have 411 today, and other free 411's if you look them up. just save them in your phone. you don't need data, or an SMS plan. 2G is still common across much of the US? who makes this shit up? Not many people even *provide* 2G anymore, and not anyone who has 2G is going to be posting on slashdot. Are there gaps in coverage, and areas under-served? absolutely.
I can get 3g in alaska, I can get 3g in wyoming. both of these are areas with extremely low population density and generally show no cov
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Everyone in the US offering UMTS/HSPA still offers 2g GSM/EDGE as well -- and on the raggedy edges of coverage, that's all you get. (Dunno about Verizon and Sprint -- they use a different family of protocols, maybe they've turned off their 2G protocols as you say.)
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Verizon does indeed still have CDMA2000 1xRTT 2G service, everywhere that that 3G is offered, as well as areas where there is no 3G coverage. I know this because I'm currently using a feature phone that I had as a backup with no 3G modem. I immediately noticed that Google turned off their SMS service since I use it multiple times every day. Guess I'll just have to use Twilio and pay 2c a text to make something similar to it.
For certain wireless providers, e.g. Ptel which is a T-Mobile reseller which is not
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Last time I was in the States (about 18 months ago), I had 2G service only. This was in Florida. About 100 miles north of Orlando. Beside a lake. With a cell tower in clear view on the opposite shore.
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As a matter of interest, there re some apposite and insightful comments at the link posted by the OP in this part of the thread:
This is Google's take on
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I was wondering what all the hoohaw was over until I realised that all the free SMS/Web gateways that one used to be able to find apparently vanished some years ago.
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I live in a US city of 100,000. I can get 3G coverage in a circle with a radius of around 3 miles. Beyond that, I can go 30 miles in any direction and have 2G coverage only.
Your idea that nobody provides 2G coverage is simply wrong. It's widely provided and is the default for many.
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I get 2G (1xRTT) more often than not. I'm more likely to have zero data service than I am to have 3G. Despite my carrier (Sprint) forcing me to pay extra for 4G/LTE, I have yet to stumble into a region with 4G/LTE coverage.
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not just in wyoming, 3 miles up a mountain in yellowstone. Also, there's cellphone signal even on the Appalachian trail these days.
how do people act like there's simply no signal? 2g is perfectly fine in plenty of instances in which 3g is not unheard of, either.
you don't need data (I don't either), but I can't imagine anyone needing to call 411 in alaska/wyoming to find something in the middle of a forest, even.
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Re: Sucks (Score:1)
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There is no other software company with as many useful free (as in beer) products.
The only reason that they can get involved with so many different projects is that they are willing to shut down the less popular/profitable ventures. Great software engineers are a scarce resource even for Google. Maybe the team that executed this plan have had a new, better idea that they want to run with. Maybe the result of ordering a couple of guys to maintain this code for X more years would be that the programmers in qu
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Great software engineers are a scarce resource even for Google. Maybe the team that executed this plan have had a new, better idea that they want to run with.
Who gives a fuck what they want? If companies like Google put the interests of their precious snowflakes of employees above their customers, they will die a horrible, deserved death.
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It was costing Google money to send every text.
AND
Google aren't a charity.
Sounds logical, but I think it leaves out an important piece of the equation. Namely Google does generate a decent income from their Adwords service. This creates advertisements which will appear on relevant Google search results pages and their network of partner sites.
Therefore, SMS search, one could argue, ALSO makes money for our friendly search engine giant from Mountain View.....right?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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Agreed.
Although, MSFT kept Bob longer than I expected - they should have killed it in utero.
Google's strategy makes sense if they really just want to be a advertising/search firm -- which may be enough to sustain them for many decades. However, every time they cancel a product that people were using and getting value from for years makes it more likely that people won't bother to try their new products and certainly won't let themselves become dependent on them. Although I liked a lot of stuff Google came o
Re:Sucks (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe someday they will actually get a marketing department that understands that the latest thing from "Fart Around Fridays" shouldn't always be "released" unless they have good reason to believe that it's sustainably profitable by some metric and they are willing to sustain it even if they are wrong in their projections. Should they choose to do so someday, it will be hard for them to become "adults" given their reputation over many years.
Actually, I think that's what has happened, and it's what's caused Google to acquire the bad reputation you speak of. When Larry Page took over a couple of years back, he immediately started demanding more focus on "world-changing" projects (at Google success is measured more by impact than by dollars; the assumption is that if you have a big enough impact there will be a way to make it profitable), and cutting the long tail of projects that weren't getting enough usage.
In your terms, Google is becoming an "adult" company, which is why they've been gradually canceling all of the non-hits which were introduced during the "throw anything and see what sticks" era -- like SMS search, assuming it's actually been cancelled. Google still does (and I hope will continue to do) more ambitious, speculative stuff than any other company out there, but there is definitely much more focus on demonstrating first that a project is going to be successful (i.e. hundreds of millions of users) than there used to be.
(Disclaimer: I work for Google, but these are my own opinions, not official company positions.)
Re:Sucks (Score:4, Insightful)
Good point.
If Google doesn't continue to create new public projects with a high subsequent cancellation rate, they probably can overcome the reputation. Speculative stuff is good, but it would be helpful if Google did a better job of "we are playing with this" (appealing to early adopters and geeks) vs. "we stand behind this" (appealing to the mass market) and carefully label projects as such and thoughtfully transition from "playing" to "stand behind". Just declaring everything "beta" forever wasn't terribly helpful.
The SMS search was not anything I ever used, but abandoning iGoogle (with plenty of notice!) disappoints me - it works, it seems like it should be very low overhead to maintain, and it does everything I need. I would think that Google could do a lot with knowing what I click on, what I have on my page, even when I click on stuff and monetize that, but I guess that wasn't in the cards.
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with Google there really only is two states of a service, runaway hit or dying.
You forgot the third: Google+
I suspect at least some of the dying services will somehow resurface as a new G+ feature.
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I'll just be pulling into random McDonald's/Starbucks
Over $300 per year (Score:2)
Data plans tend to be cheapish these days.
Including international data roaming? And even for someone who stays in the same country all the time, there's a huge gap between $7/mo for dumbphone service on Virgin Mobile and $35/mo for smartphone service on the same carrier. How do you call $336 per year "cheapish"?
Re: Over $300 per year (Score:2)
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Data plans tend to be cheapish these days.
Including international data roaming? And even for someone who stays in the same country all the time, there's a huge gap between $7/mo for dumbphone service on Virgin Mobile and $35/mo for smartphone service on the same carrier. How do you call $336 per year "cheapish"?
it's international part that will kill your dream(3g roaming is horribly expensive per megabyte). but anyhow, over here you can get 256kbyte/s unlimited service with any 3-4 euro /month plan (2mbit like 8-9euro/month).
though, it's probable that some operator they were pushing their sms's through told 'em that they wouldn't do it for free anymore.
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That'd be my take. It's not free- it's just that the users didn't have to pay for it's use. If they're not going to make money off of it (If they were actually "monetizing" this as some have claimed...they'd not have pulled the plug, folks...) then it doesn't make sense to keep it going. They are, after all, a business.
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Seriously. All the people with their panties in a wad over this...you're not entitled
You must be an old person.
Anyone under 25 is entitled to EVERYTHING, they're entitled to it FOREVER and they're entitled to it for FREE.
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1) If you're pissing, moaning, and groaning about $28/mo such that it's REALLY that sort of a problem, you've got more problems than having SMS search will fix.
Damned straight. Poor people smell funny and shouldn't be allowed to use the internet. Single moms -- Screw 'em. Old folks on a fixed income -- Too damned bad, granny. War vets -- What did they ever do for us?
If you're more interested in putting $300 into healthcare or rent or food or your kids' education, then you don't deserve the internet. There's nothing on there for you anyway.
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Sucks since I don't have a data plan... But an (very short) explanation is here http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/websearch/yKG7BGro7QQ/ntAXQWWKj70J [google.com]
How does "Closing products always involves tough choices, but we do think very hard about each decision and its implications for our users. Streamlining our services enables us to focus on creating beautiful technology that will improve people’s lives" qualify as an explanation?
That's just a employee shilling the company line.
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Sucks since I don't have a data plan... But an (very short) explanation is here http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/websearch/yKG7BGro7QQ/ntAXQWWKj70J [google.com]
How does "Closing products always involves tough choices, but we do think very hard about each decision and its implications for our users. Streamlining our services enables us to focus on creating beautiful technology that will improve people’s lives" qualify as an explanation?
That's just a employee shilling the company line.
Especially when the same response showed up more than once word for word from different people.
But there is free Information service available (Score:2)
Killed because it wasn't a revenue generator (Score:2)
Why is it that folks still have issues when a "Free" service suddenly is removed? I realize that folks used this service since they didn't have a mobile data plan, but really how is it that Google was making money with this? I mean they couldn't really target you for ads could they?
There's no such thing as a free lunch. Free but no free lunch. [hgjones.org]
Re:Killed because it wasn't a revenue generator (Score:4, Insightful)
There are two issues from the user's perspective when a free service is suddenly shutdown:
1. The free service has become an expectation and important part of their routine.
2. There is no way to plan for alternatives, if they even exist,
No, there is no legal obligation for Google to keep such a service running, but the least they could have done is give a few weeks or months of warning, maybe point out equivalent services (sms based), and thus offer people a way to migrate. Instead, they just dropped everyone on the floor and said, "Go sign up for a data plan <shrug>"
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I don't think that attitude is limited to America.
Re:grow up, you entitled shit (Score:4, Informative)
You are forgetting estoppel:
Estoppel in its broadest sense is a legal term referring to a series of legal and equitable doctrines that preclude "a person from denying or asserting anything to the contrary of that which has, in contemplation of law, been established as the truth, either by the acts of judicial or legislative officers, or by his own deed, acts, or representations, either express or implied." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estoppel] (emphasis mine).
A common example is a stream on private property that borders a road. If people have come to take water from the stream, even if the landowner povided a pipe on his own land to make it easy (that did not extend to the public property), then after some time, the landowner can not suddenly deny access to the water in that stream, whether by his pipe, or not. If he tried, a court would likely grant a public "easement by estoppel".
The same principle is used in divorce cases to ensure that a soon to be ex-wife received alimony so that she may live "in the manner to which she has become accustomed", even as alimony is granted less and less frequently in recognition of women's ability to independently earn income. (It is still granted in many cases when a wife has never worked, and her husband supported her: she often gets 50% of the community property (to which she contributed nothing financially) AND alimony.)
So, if a company provides a free service, that many have come to rely upon, for some significant time, it may very well be held to continue to provide that service, unless the nature of the free offering was made clear (e.g. reserving the right to discontinue it at any time).
Generally, estoppel applies to either real property easements, or income streams, or other tangible benefit, but I see no reason that it can not be applied to a service.
In this case, the court would weigh the time the service was offered, the reasonable expectations of the public regarding it, and the public harm if it were terminated against the costs of the company to continue to provide it for free.
Be warned, however, that public easements by estoppel, for even an essential thing like water, often only are granted if free access was provided for extended periods of time, say 25 or 50 years. Often this is codified in municipal bylaws, or state, or federal laws.
This is why one should ALWAYS be careful of "being nice": one may unwittingly create an obligation by estoppel to continue to do so.
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Umm.... maybe she raised the kids and took care of the house so her partner could focus on working and, had she not done that, her partner would have been unable to make as much money for the household? If she just sat around eating bon-bons and watching soap operas in a moo-moo, the partner was either okay with that or not smart enough to divorce her before "50% of community property" amounted to much.
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Umm.... maybe she raised the kids and took care of the house so her partner could focus on working and, had she not done that, her partner would have been unable to make as much money for the household? If she just sat around eating bon-bons and watching soap operas in a moo-moo, the partner was either okay with that or not smart enough to divorce her before "50% of community property" amounted to much.
...you do understand what financially means? in the scenario she contributed effort, not money.
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yes, of course i understand what "financially" means. the partner's efforts meant the family didn't have to buy the labor on the open market and buying that labor would have cost money. hence, the partner may well have contributed financially in a fairly direct way. by your definition, the "bread winner" also didn't contribute financially if they worked at a salaried/hourly job -- some business (the "bread winner's" employer) did contribute to the family financially, but all the "bread winner" contributed w
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Bullshit. My then-wife was so lazy, CPS required me to hire a maid and nanny to care for the kids, because she was neglecting them,
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No, I was not smart enough to divorce her before 50% community property amounted to much. Mea culpa.
Not only did she sit around, watching TV, letting the nanny and maid (paid for by me) raise the kids, but she actively trashed the house.
"In the manner to which she has become accustomed" should be replaced by "commensurate with the degree she contributed to the household". I don't buy that a stay at home wife is "worth" half her working husband's earnings: at most she's worth the value of a maid and nanny (w
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Sounds like a concept that needs to be killed with fire.
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Generally speaking, estoppel may only be used as a "shield" and not as a "sword". You are suggesting here that estoppel be used in order to force google to continue to provide a service, that is, as a sword. This is different that the typical situations in which estoppel is available where someone promises not to do something, though they have the legal right to do so and then go against this promise. It is highly unlikely that estoppel would be available in this context.
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Actually, the principle of estoppel HAS been used in divorce cases to compel a man to continue to support his now ex-wife in "the manner to which she has become accustomed".
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This is the same country that had a company give out a bonus turkey to people at Christmas. One year when times were tough they didn't, so employees sued claiming it wasn't a bonus but part of compensation they expected...and won at the Supreme Court.
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What service should I cut? (Score:2)
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your data plan
why is it so important anyway, not like the SMS service was any good
Re:Killed because it wasn't a revenue generator (Score:5, Informative)
"Why is it that folks still have issues when a "Free" service suddenly is removed?"
Because having a service yanked out from under you is annoying? Furthermore, your use of the word "free" is somewhat limited. Google makes money off of users. It monetizes your search traffic, your emails, and tracks your site visitation patterns. It monitors which ads you click on, which you don't, and how to best use that data to better sell more ads. It leverages its share of the search and web services market in a number of ways to support these endeavors.
When you become part of the Google ecosystem, you are agreeing to share data with them that is incontrovertibly *valuable*, even if they never put a value on it, and no money changes hands. So you're right. No such thing as a free lunch. But when I use Google services, I'm paying them with my own personal usage data -- and they're obviously quite happy to use that data in a great many ways to "enhance" product offerings.
I'm not arguing that Google SMS deserved to live, or that Google is morally or legally in the wrong for closing it, but Google is compensated with information when I use its products. It may not cost me any money, but if I give you something you find valuable in exchange for a good or service, there's still an exchange taking place.
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They didn't have a monthly/yearly contract with you to buy your information. They decided to discontinue buying you. Tough.
Maybe you should try an arrangement with another company where you are the actual customer, rather than their product.
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* your use of the word "free" is somewhat limited. Google makes money off of users *
You've almost figured it out. But you are google's product. or, to put it in ranching terms, you are the cattle. a rancher has no obligation to the cattle even though the rancher makes money off of it. at one year they decide which animals will be culled and the unlucky beast gets a bullet to the brain. this is what google is doing to the users of certain services.
so the exchange of which you speak still obligates google
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one year they decide which animals will be culled and the unlucky beast gets a bullet to the brain. this is what google is doing to the users of certain services.
No it isn't. Those cattle get sold for their meat and make a profit for the rancher. These users are no longer sources of profit for google. They aren't being culled, they are being starved to death - a death that doesn't help anyone, neither the rancher nor the cattle benefit.
Re:Killed because it wasn't a revenue generator (Score:4, Informative)
Clearly you need more than a "fucking phone" if you want to use Google Search on it.
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No, all you needed was a dumbphone, a text messaging plan and a subsidy from Google
Some of us have no desire for a smartphone... I hate touch screens... I hate the size of the smartphones themselves...
There's plenty of small feature phones with real keyboards and decent web browsers (it's been basically Nokia's business model for a decade). Anything that can run Opera Mini is more than enough to search Google and get directions.
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How to free up that much in my budget (Score:2)
data plans cost $10-20 over the base plans for month to month type services
Virgin Mobile quoted me $28 per month for its cheapest voice and data plan per smartphones ($35 per month) compared to its cheapest pay-per-minute voice-only plan for dumbphones ($20 per 90 days). What should I stop buying in order to free up an extra $28 per month in my budget?
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Even if it is true that google is making money off you, you should realize they will stop giving you service if and when they decide you are not making enough money.
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Are you asserting that people shouldn't complain when they are annoyed? Because that's what it sounds like.
Sorry, but I believe that complaining when a company annoys you is a public service. It warns others. (Admittedly, it's gotten to the point where I expect Google to drop any free service without warning, but there are always people who need to be reminded.)
That said, Google also has a perfect right to drop any service that they aren't contractually obligated to maintain. But this doesn't imply that
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Are you asserting that people shouldn't complain when they are annoyed? Because that's what it sounds like.
People shouldn't complain when they are annoyed by Google, because everything Google does is Awesome (TM). In fact, I'm glad they dropped this service out-of-the-blue, because now we know who the unbelievers are.
If Apple (or, less so, Microsoft) does something that annoys you, then you are allowed to whine on Slashdot.
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They have the right. I'll consider them silly, but they do indeed have that right.
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Why is it that folks still have issues when a "Free" service suddenly is removed?
Google today announced the end of its 'Google Docs' experiment. Chairman Eric Schmidt said "Hosting documents for free didn't generate revenue. We started that product line for tactical reasons. Microsoft tried to move into our search business with Bing, and we had to respond to that threat. Today, the only people using Bing are Internet Explorer users who don't know how to change the default search engine, Bing is no longer a threat to us. So we're exiting the "documents" business to focus on our primar
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Why is it that folks still have issues when a "Free" service suddenly is removed?
With Google now there is starting to become a worrying pattern where they use their dominant search position and money press to launch free services that push competitors out of the market, and then start charge for it or close it down when the competitors are dead. As they did with Maps. This I have a bigger problem with than just the user annoyance caused by the disappearance of a free service.
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Huh? Google Maps still exists
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ALICE: "Hey Bob, will you come hold this ladder for me while I climb up on the roof, make sure it doesn't fall over."
BOB: "OK"
Bob holds the ladder, Alice climbs up on the roof. Bob gets bored and leaves, and the ladder falls over.
ALICE (on cellphone to Bob): "Hey you jerk! You left me up here on the roof! Why didn't you stay?"
BOB: "It's not like you were paying me or anything. You should be grateful that I stayed for as long as I did."
Now, how should Alice react? There probably isn't any sort of legal rem
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Meh, you're exaggerating my analogy; Alice was able to call a friend on her phone and she got down from the roof just fine. And Bob could have said "No sorry, I can't hold the ladder for you," or he could have said, "I'm so sorry, but I forgot I left my oven on," or he could have shouted up the ladder, "Hey Alice, sorry but I really have to go!"
But I won't try to convince you further unless you want me to.
Love it! (Score:1, Insightful)
I get downmodded every time I bring this up [slashdot.org]...
Re:Love it! (Score:5, Interesting)
also one will get downmodded for pointing out that google can legitimately yank its free services any time it pleases, there is no moral obligation for it to provide any thing for free or to notify anyone when such free services are cut off.
thankfully, with its biggest service, the normal search engine, the free users won't get dumped because they are not the customer but the product and as such are worth money
damn you.... (Score:1)
Its no big deal (Score:2)
Free incoming texts in those countries. (Score:2)
Sucks (Score:1)
I'm not a happy !! I used the sms to find address ,numbers, etc.. This is the worse mistake Google could have made.
Yes (Score:1)
Re: The Google Plan... (Score:2)
Re:The Google Plan... (Score:4, Informative)
What competition was there for this service? I'd never heard of it, or anything like it, before. (I don't use SMS, so that's no be surprise.)
I think that when you get to step 2 you are talking about the wrong company. Google often, perhaps usually, doesn't have any competition for their minor projects. Sometimes the competition develops AFTER they show up. If there was prior competition for Picassa, for example, I never heard of it.