Firebaser here! We've been investing pretty heavily in the platform so I think we will be around for a while. Worth noting that YouTube, Double click and Android were all Google acquisitions too!
This knee-jerk-ism is tiresome. There are plenty of products that Google has retired, and plenty of products that Google has continued to invest in. Just like any other big corporation.
(acquisition still running, top of my head: Google Docs, Android, YouTube, DoubleClick)
The problem is the google isn't forthright about it's plans. They just let some products languish forever without any communication. If you're lucky (like a firebase user) you will get a giant code dump of new features after 18 months of radio silence. If you're unlucky (like a google app engine standard user) then maybe they will announce a shutdown. It could go either way - you will never know what's coming. Yes you will get time to migrate away, but you're not really treated like a partner.
At some point they said google code wasn't getting new features because they couldn't find anyone who wanted to work on it. WTF? That's what employees are for right? I cannot understand this company. Why waste peoples time with projects that are just rounding errors next to adwords.
And is it anymore than other big corporation? That pages lists 24 products, which doesn't seem that much to me. There have been plenty of stories about retired products at FB, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, etc.
Im not disputing that Google does this, but ever since Google Reader was stopped this has become a stock comment on basically every HN discussion on Google products (other than search & ads) and has long ceased to have any value at all, and seems to be just accepted as some gospel without any evidence that this is a bigger problem with Google than the other tech giants.
in jannes' and hk__2's defence, that Wikipedia category page looks very incomplete. I'm sure the number is far higher than 24.
Perhaps it's HN apophenia but Google's record of discontinuance does not seem insignificant - it is valid for anyone to be skeptical of their ability to maintain any newer product in the medium term.
That said, I think anyone who's followed Firebase closely since the acquisition should have reasons to have more confidence in their commitment in this one particular case.
The list forgot "Google Desktop Search" - One of my favorite google product.
I like it so much that I even found a old copy to install on windows 10. 6 years after it is discontinue and still much more useful and much faster than windows 10's search bar.
They have since acquired more companies to complement the offer and released a new product called Cloud Firestore very recently. They are also doing conferences promoting it in lots of places. Doubt it's going away very soon.
