Google Reader to shut down, other options available
Google Reader, one of the best-known RSS feeds, is shutting down come July 1.
The feature, which users used to pull together content from their favorite websites, will only be up for a few more months.
“While the product has a loyal following, over the years usage has declined,” said Google Vice President Urs Holzle in a post on the official Google blog about the closing of Reader.
For the next four months, users can port their current content to another RSS feed by using Google Takeout.
According to CNN the move is a part of a massive “spring cleaning” that Google began n 2011. Google has shut down 70 of its products in part of the “spring cleaning.”
“It’s been a long time since we have had this rate of change – it probably hasn’t happened since the birth of personal computing 40 years ago. To make the most of these opportunities, we need to focus – otherwise we spread ourselves too thin and lack impact,” Holzle wrote in his blog post.
Within hours of the announcement, there were multiple online petitions to save Google Reader.
As of Thursday afternoon more than 66,000 people have signed the “Google: Keep Google Reader Running” petition on Change.org.
“Our confidence in Google’s other products — Gmail, YouTube, and yes, even Plus — requires that we trust you in respecting how and why we use your other products,” wrote Dan Lewis, of New York City, who created the petition. “This isn’t just about our data in Reader. This is about us using your product because we love it, because it makes our lives better, and because we trust you not to nuke it.”
Other options:
There are other RSS feed options, some of which are recently launched. Feedly and Pulse offer web-based feeds but also have mobile apps for Apple’s iOS and Android.
Flipboard released a statement Thursday which said they will allow users to directly import their Google Reader content to their platform.
If you read your RSS Reader on multiple devices, you should probably opt for a could-based reader such as NetVibes.
Follow Mary Ann Georgantopoulos on Twitter @marygeorgant
