Google and Open Source Feeds: Here Today, Gone Tomorrow?

There's more going on than Google just eliminating Reader. For example, TechCruch reports that Google has killed its RSS subscription extension for Chrome. And then there is Feedburner. Google acquired the RSS/Atom feed management company in June 2007 for $100 million. Pocket change for Google. TechCrunch's Frederic Lardinois writes:

I always assumed Google would keep Feedburner on life support for as long as it could, but the fact that they are shutting down Reader shows that they are willing to make these unpopular moves and close products that form the basis of a larger ecosystem (I’m sure the teams at Reeder, Feedly and other Google Reader-based services are scrambling right now). I can’t imagine that Feedburner will live through many more of these spring cleanings given that it is Google’s last RSS-focused product that’s still standing.

For more, see his post, The Google Reader Shutdown Is Yet Another Nail In Feedburner’s Coffin (NB: TechCrunch's own feeds use Feedburner's feed management system.)

By far, the best article I have read about the strategic business changes underway at Google is Felix Salmon's Did Google just kill RSS? (Reuters think piece; hat tip to Mark's post) Salmon closes his analysis and commentary with some thoughts about RSS (let's add Atom):

RSS has been dying for years — that’s why Google killed Reader. It was a lovely open format; it has sadly been replaced with proprietary feeds like the ones we get from Twitter and Facebook. That’s not an improvement, but it is reality. Google, with Reader, was really providing the life-support mechanism for RSS. Once Reader is gone, I fear that RSS won’t last much longer.

Others have a more optimistic outlook. Some view the demise of Reader as reinvigorating innovation and competition in open source feed desktop apps and sync platforms. Only time will tell. [JH]