Google to remove iGoogle, Symbian Search App and more

Google has stated on its official blog that they intend on doing some ‘spring cleaning’ this summer by shutting down services and apps that have become obsolete and old. The company mentioned that since last fall, they started the cleaning process, which involved closing down or combining more than thirty products. The company has also announced a few more closures that includes shutting down iGoogle soon and the Symbian Search App as well. The summary of the changes is listed below.

Google Mini has been an important part of Google’s Enterprise Search offering since it was first introduced in 2005. It has had a good run, but beginning July 31, Google is planning on discontinuing the product because its functionality can be better provided by products like Google Search Appliance, Google Site Search and Google Commerce Search. The company will, of course, continue to provide technical support to Mini customers for the duration of their contracts, and will reach out to them shortly with more details.

It's cleaning time!

Google Talk Chatback allowed websites to embed a Google Talk widget so that they could engage with their visitors. It’s now outdated, so they are turning off Chatback and encouraging websites to use the Meebo bar. It is important to mention that Google had acquired Meebo for an undisclosed sum. The seven-year old start-up started life as a browser-based messaging service back in 2005 and since then has turned into a social toolbar for sharing links and webpages across multiple social networking sites. Google has further confirmed that the existing Meebo team will be joining the Google+ team.

Google Video stopped accepting uploads in May 2009. Later this summer, the company will be moving the remaining hosted content to YouTube. Google Video users have until August 20 to migrate, delete or download their content. Following that time period, the company will then move all remaining Google Video content to YouTube as private videos that users can access in YouTube video manager.

On November 1, 2013, iGoogle will be retired. iGoogle was originally launched back in 2005 before anyone could fully imagine the ways that today's web and mobile apps would put personalized, real-time information at their fingertips. With modern apps that run on platforms like Chrome and Android, the need for iGoogle has eroded over time, so the company has planned to wind it down. Users will have 16 months to adjust or export their data.

Along with this, Google has also announced that the Symbian Search App will be shut down to focus their efforts on mobile web search experience. For all the Symbian users, the web experience will enable users to make the most of the web-wide improvements.

So that spells the end of the road for a number of Google services, but as always, there’s always something new to look forward to.