The perils of 'free' web software

I was always sceptical of those who warned against using 'free' web software. Why would Google, I thought, risk annoying its users by discontinuing a service? Now I'm not so sure.

I read on TechCrunch that Google has decided to withdraw a number of applications. Some of these, like Google video, are obviously redundant. But the list includes Notebook which I use frequently as a firefox plugin.

Apart from my annoyance that this is to be discontinued without consultation or serious thought for existing users' alternatives, it's a very useful and timely warning. I was just wondering about ditching Microsoft Office and migrating to Google Docs. Not any more. Imagine waking up one day and discovering that Google had stopped providing spreadsheets!

Google are perfectly within their rights to do this, of course. But its action make you remember the perils of a free service where you don't have a proper contract with the service provider.

Indian attacks shouldn't be Google's number one

Martin Belam (who is infinitely brighter and better qualified than me) thinks that it is a failure of search engines that search results for Mumbai and India don't have stories about the terrorist attacks at the top. I don't agree.

The terrorist attacks may be the most significant thing about Mumbai or even India, today. But search results are about more than that, signified by Google's weighting to older content. The terrorist attacks will be dealt with and the city needs to recover. What it doesn't need is a prospective American tourist deciding not to visit in three months time (assuming it doesn't run contrary to state department advice) because of a legacy story on a search engine.

There are issues about news and search, demonstrated by the coverage around Bob Woolmer's death (as opposed to the reports of his murder). Google News is a step in the right direction although that's not without its problems. But if the main Google search results worked in the way Martin suggests, it could be more bad news for Mumbai.