Essentially, the concept of a competitive consumer-facing Jaiku destination site and mobile app is dead, as Google says they will “no longer actively develop the Jaiku codebase.” However, what they hint at is interesting: “With the open source Jaiku Engine project, organizations, groups and individuals will be able to roll-their-own microblogging services and deploy them on Google App Engine.”
In other words, it sounds like Google is working on a competitor to the host of enterprise-focused microblogging tools that have sprung up in the wake of Twitter’s success, or at least a service that will lure some paying users to Google App Engine. Open sourcing the code is especially interesting, as it means developers will be able to use the core of Jaiku to work on their own unique microblogging tools and offer them to either consumers or business users.
The news comes amidst a myriad of other not-so-good Google news this evening, including the shutdown of Dodgeball and Google Notebook, no more Google Video uploads, and layoffs of 100 human resources employees.