Google has announced that it will be shutting down Picasa starting March, nearly 12 years since the company acquired the photo storage service back in 2004. This news does not come as much of a surprise as Picasa’s relevance has diminished over the years.
Google will close down Picasa’s desktop app starting in March, Picasa’s web albums won’t be editable starting May. Unsurprisingly, Google is promoting its own Google Photos app as a replacement for Picasa. Google claims that users with a Picasa account will be able to log in to Google Photos and have their photos and videos from Picasa, available on Google Photos. But Google isn’t forcing its own app down everyone’s throats. Picasa’s web albums will still be accessible for downloading and deleting content, just without the option to edit them.
Back in 2004 when Google acquired Picasa, the plan was to put Google into the competition alongside Yahoo and Microsoft’s MSN. A year after that, Yahoo purchased Flickr, a image and video hosting website, which exists till this date. But Yahoo is working hard to keep Flickr’s on par and in line with the rest of the competition today, alongside new app innovations. Fast forward to today, Yahoo and MSN is seemingly dwarfed by Google’s overwhelming presence on the web. Have you heard about Picasa? Comment below!
Source: The Verge
