Google Reader Demise Trumps The New Pope

Apparently there was a new pope chosen yesterday but you probably wouldn't have caught the news as easily on Twitter. This is due to the uproar that was caused when Google announced the closure of Google Reader on July 1st 2013. Business people, Social Media enthusiasts, Gamers, Journalists and other peeps were just so outraged that Google Reader began trending on Twitter and is still trending at the time of writing! There was even a petition submitted set up and it currently has over 60,000 names!

We can only guess at the thinking behind this but I would hazard a guess that it has something to do with getting more people on Google +. Also lots of people sync their Google Reader feeds to other platforms and, of course, Google can't sell ad space on those. It seems a bit of a shame that this was such an abrupt affair. People have a lot of trust in the Google brand and I think something like this will have a negative impact.  If an increase Google + usage is the goal, why not integrate Google Reader with Google + then look at phasing it out over a longer period of time? July seems very sudden.

Then again Google Reader wasn't the most social of tools and RSS is almost 15 years old now! Maybe  it's just the next stage in our evolution of online media consumption. I guess we'll move to something which is targeted, customisable but also social....