Google to shut down iGoogle, Google Video and other services

Google to shut down iGoogle, Google Video and other services

Google says iGoogle is soon going the way of Aardvark.

Since Larry Page took the helm as Google chief executive in April 2011, the tech giant has more aggressively closed services to focus on its strengths. Now five more products, including Google Video and iGoogle, are on the chopping block, the company announced Tuesday in a blog post.

Some of these products are getting the axe because they became outdated or redundant, Google said.

Take Google Video, which stopped taking uploads in May 2009. It’s now officially migrating all users’ content to YouTube. Users have until August 20 to “migrate, delete or download” their videos, the company said.

iGoogle, the search giant’s personalized Web portal, launched in 2005. It will retire in November 2013.

iGoogle was created “before anyone could fully imagine the ways that today's web and mobile apps would put personalized, real-time information at your fingertips,” the company said. “With modern apps that run on platforms like Chrome and Android, the need for iGoogle has eroded over time, so we’ll be winding it down.”

Three other services Google is winding down are Google Mini, the Symbian Search App and Google Talk Chatback.

The services join a growing pile of relatively obscure products that Google has purged. A list from September of services to be retired included Aardvark, Fast Flip and Google Pack. The company said it has shut down more than 30 products since last fall.

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