For a lot of us, the news that Google are to shut down Google Reader come July 1st was a shock. I certainly didn’t see it coming and considering that I use it on a daily basis, I had no idea that Google were eyeing it up for an early retirement. What’s done, is done and the only thing we can do is to prepare ourselves for when July 1st comes around and find alternatives to use. Google might well be helping us with that as their own Google Reader app is no longer available to download from the Play Store as Android Police are reporting.
If you have the app installed on any of your Android devices, then you’ll still see the app on the Play Store website, but if you were to load an incognito window or head to the listing from a PC you’re not signed in on, you’ll be greeted with a 404. It’s sad to see the app go but, let’s face it if they really having a “spring clean” it’d make sense to get things started early. While it’s true that more people than ever are finding news through social means, RSS will always have a place on the Internet, with Google Reader gone there might be a little shake-up on the RSS stage.
Alternatives to Google Reader aren’t hard to come by but, none of them have the infrastructure of Google behind them so, a lot of them are crumbling under the weight of so many new users. A lot of “hardcore” RSS users will be reading their feeds on their Desktop, if that’s the case we have some alternatives for you to try here and to fill the gap on Android take a look here.
Are you still mourning the loss of Google Reader? There are a lot of companies that are promising some sort of transition from the RSS giant, Feedly will have a transition helper and gReader has loose plans to do something similar. Overall, it’s a bummer for a lot of people but, what are Google to do? Keep a fledgling service open just for the sake of it?