Google Acquired SketchUp

I was screaming my head out when I first read this sad news at Core77 and ArchiDose. According to SketchUp official statement it seems that Google bought up SketchUp and the parent company - @last software due to flexibility in inserting 3D models in Google Earth.

If you’ve never seen it, Google Earth lets you explore the world from your desktop and it’s free! Remember those flying dreams you had as a kid? This is it…only without the flannel pajamas; mine had those built in feet. Just type in where you want to go and this thing will fly you directly over the spot!

Is this good or bad new for the SketchUp user? Personally I would give it a big No for the acquiresation due to the fact that Google seems to be chunking out lousy software, just to name a few - Google Desktop which is so un-user friendly, and not to mention the Gmail where I believe most of the user out there used it to store their spam mails, and their blogging platform known as blogspot which seems to have minor improvement through out the years.

One of the biggest reasons we chose to go ahead with this deal was that it was a good thing for our users. We’ll keep SketchUp simple and easy, and we’ll continue to make it more useful and powerful. Looking ahead, the product will improve, the user experience will get better, and the community will grow. I think the future of SketchUp is brighter than it’s ever been before.

One thing I notice about Google is that once they manage to acquire a company for an undisclosed amount of money, they would eventually release the next version of software for free, which come to the big question. Will SketchUp 6 be given out free by Google? I would say he chances are very high, take a look at Picasa, Google Analytic, Blogspot and many more, these softwares and services used to cost as much as few hundred dollars to buy, now they’re all free.

I hear you. The truth is, we’ve been changing SketchUp since the beginning. Every new version has been an improvement on the previous one, and we’re going to keep it that way. The goal here is to introduce SketchUp to a wider audience and to continue to make it the best 3D software around. SketchUp is only going to get better—I promise.

Let us all pray that Google don’t turn SketchUp into another one of their beta products that has not much improvement through out the years like blogspot, picasa and others. I would rather pay for a good service or product.

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