

Google Helpout is shutting down - aren55555
https://support.google.com/helpouts/answer/6167468

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tsomctl
Let's say you're traveling, passing through a foreign city, and are going to
spend the night there. Several days previous, you had talked to an
acquaintance, and they were going to let you sleep on their floor for the
night. Now, when you show up, the acquaintance closes the door in your face
and you have to go find a motel 10 o'clock at night.

Similar thing when Google shuts down a service. Yes, it was a free service,
and they have no legal obligation to keep it going. But it is still rude.
People have invested time into using it, and now must invest more time into
finding a competing service, and transferring everything over. People are
going to stop using Google's smaller services to avoid this risk.

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coda_
Hopefully this can be a constructive conversation. Instead of just bashing
google for once again shutting something down, I'd like to hear what
obligation people feel a company has to keep a service alive that isn't living
up to it's expectations.

~~~
skullum
I'll give it a shot. Its about a difference in expectations for success,
specifically how Google's differ from its users.

So what obligation does Google have to keep the service alive? None. But the
spirit and marketing of the site was to connect and create a community of
people helping each other. And Google is going to destroy that community for
(probably very reasonable) business reasons.

I guess I would like Google to give a warning that if a site doesn't reach
some n DAUs then the service won't take off. It might give some people pause
before putting a lot of work into something they ultimately don't have control
over.

I feel users have a legitimate cause to be upset when a site is closed -- this
was a real community that because Google couldn't make enough money off them,
is gone.

