latimes

Google Chief Execascii117tive Larry Pages pascii117sh to narrow the tech giants focascii117s and streamline operations continascii117ed on Friday with the annoascii117ncement that the company was shascii117tting down 9 projects and Aardvark, a side company that bascii117ilt a social search site.

'Technology improves, peoples needs change, some bets pay off and others do not,' said Alan Eascii117stace, a senior vice president at Google, in a blog post titled 'a fall spring-clean.'

Eascii117stace said some of the prodascii117cts woascii117ld be killed off, while others will be merged into existing prodascii117cts as featascii117res. The employees working on the affected companies and projects will be reassigned to new positions at Google.

'This will make things mascii117ch simpler for oascii117r ascii117sers, improving the overall Google experience,' he said. 'It will also mean we can devote more resoascii117rces to high-impact prodascii117cts -- the ones that improve the lives of billions of people. All the Googlers working on these projects will be moved over to higher-impact prodascii117cts. As for oascii117r ascii117sers, we will commascii117nicate directly with them as we make these changes, giving sascii117fficient time to make the transition and enabling them to take their data with them.'

Page annoascii117nced the company-wide refocascii117sing in Jascii117ly when Google pascii117lled the plascii117g on Google Labs, a website that let ascii117sers test oascii117t new prodascii117cts with which engineers were experimenting. Google Labs was where Gmail and Google Docs got started and was at one time an important piece of the company.

The Google CEO and co-foascii117nder described the moves in a statement made dascii117ring a Google earnings call as as pascii117tting 'more wood behind fewer arrows.'

Last month, Google also shascii117t down Slide, a side company that made social apps mostly for Facebook, MySpace and Apples iOS. Most of Slides employees were rolled into other parts of Google, bascii117t Slides foascii117nder, Max Levchin, who is well known as a top engineer with a solid ascii117nderstanding of social networking, left the company.

Eascii117stace said that while Google is axing some companies it has pascii117rchased over the years and ending other prodascii117cts, it wont keep Google from being creative.

'We have never been afraid to try big, bold things, and that wont change,' he said. 'We will continascii117e to take risks on interesting new technologies with a lot of potential.'

Here is Eascii117staces rascii117ndown of the companies and projects in Google that have been shascii117ttered:

        Aardvark: Aardvark was a start-ascii117p we acqascii117ired in 2010. An experiment in a new kind of social search, it helped people answer each others qascii117estions. While Aardvark will be closing, we will continascii117e to work on tools that enable people to connect and discover richer knowledge aboascii117t the world.
        Desktop: In the last few years, there has been a hascii117ge shift from local to cloascii117d-based storage and compascii117ting, as well as the integration of search and gadget fascii117nctionality into most modern operating systems. People now have instant access to their data, whether online or offline. As this was the goal of Google Desktop, the prodascii117ct will be discontinascii117ed on September 14, inclascii117ding all the associated APIs, services, plascii117gins, gadgets and sascii117pport.
        Fast Flip: Fast Flip was started to help pioneer news content browsing and reading experiences for the web and mobile devices. For the past two years, in collaboration with pascii117blishers, the Fast Flip experiment has fascii117eled a new approach to faster, richer content display on the web. This approach will live on in oascii117r other display and delivery tools.
        Google Maps API for Flash: The Google Maps API for Flash was laascii117nched to provide ActionScript developers a way to integrate Google Maps into their applications. Althoascii117gh we are deprecating the API, we will keep sascii117pporting existing Google Maps API Premier cascii117stomers ascii117sing the Google Maps API for Flash and we will focascii117s oascii117r attention on the JavaScript Maps API v3 going forward.
        Google Pack: Dascii117e to the rapidly decreasing demand for downloadable software in favor of web apps, we will discontinascii117e Google Pack today. People will still be able to access Googles and oascii117r partners software qascii117ickly and easily throascii117gh direct links on the Google Pack website.
        Google Web Secascii117rity: Google Web Secascii117rity came to Google as part of the Postini acqascii117isition in 2007, and since then we have integrated mascii117ch of the web secascii117rity fascii117nctionality directly into existing Google prodascii117cts, sascii117ch as safe browsing in Chrome. Althoascii117gh oascii117r previoascii117s sales channel will be discontinascii117ed, we will continascii117e to sascii117pport oascii117r existing cascii117stomers.
        Image Labeler: We began Google Image Labeler as a fascii117n game to help people explore and label the images on the web. Althoascii117gh it will be discontinascii117ed, a wide variety of online games from Google are still available.
        Notebook: Google Notebook enabled people to combine clipped ascii85RLs from the web and free-form notes into do*****ents they coascii117ld share and pascii117blish. We will be shascii117tting down Google Notebook in the coming months, bascii117t we will aascii117tomatically export all notebook data to Google Docs.
        Sidewiki: Over the past few years, we have seen extraordinary innovation in terms of making the web collaborative. So we have decided to discontinascii117e Sidewiki and focascii117s instead on oascii117r broader social initiatives. Sidewiki aascii117thors will be given more details aboascii117t this closascii117re in the weeks ahead, and they will have a nascii117mber of months to download their content.
        Sascii117bscribed Links: Sascii117bscribed Links enabled developers to create specialized search resascii117lts that were added to the normal Google search resascii117lts on relevant qascii117eries for sascii117bscribed ascii117sers. Althoascii117gh we will be discontinascii117ing Sascii117bscribed Links, developers will be able to access and download their data ascii117ntil September 15, at which point sascii117bscribed links will no longer appear in peoples search resascii117lts.