Google Launches 'Keep' To Rival Evernote

Today Google launched 'Google Keep', a mobile note-taking service to rival software like Evernote. It works on devices running Android 4.0 or later, and there's also a web interface (which is struggling under launch load as of this writing). Google describes the service thus: "With Keep you can quickly jot ideas down when you think of them and even include checklists and photos to keep track of what’s important to you. Your notes are safely stored in Google Drive and synced to all your devices so you can always have them at hand. If it’s more convenient to speak than to type that’s fine—Keep transcribes voice memos for you automatically. There’s super-fast search to find what you’re looking for and when you’re finished with a note you can archive or delete it." Fans of Google Reader will probably be a bit hesitant to pick this up.

Comments

Can't wait until next spring

[thetoadwarrior]

I'm pretty sure that's when this will get the axe.

Hard to trust

[boshvark]

I'm pretty sure Evernote will not suddenly "retire" its service and leave users out to dry. Sorry, Google Keep. Even if you're everything I ever dreamed of, you've arrived at the wrong place and the wrong time.

Re:Hard to trust

[JanneM]

I don't trust Evernote either. It is their main line of business so it's unlikely to be "spring cleaned". But they can certainly go bankupt or bought by a rival and lose the cervice altogether. Or they can move in a direction that makes future versions bad or unusable for me. When it's the cloud you can never stay with a previous version.

Anything critical, you use an offline app. Use the net only for syncing, preferably through file sharing or other system-agnostic manner.

Fool me once...

[rgbscan]

I've been burned by too many "non-core" Google applications to even be bothered to try this. I mean, look up the old Google Notebook. Basically the same thing. If it ain't search, advertising, or social.... it's only a matter of time till you get scroogled. (Funny I thought that was the dumbest MS campaign ever....but it's starting to grow on me).

Google Notebook

[CremIon]

Anyone remember Google Notebook...?

So...Google Keep...

[CremIon]

...until it's Gone...?

Re:So...Google Keep...

[dclozier]

At which point it will be renamed Google Kept.

Re:screw google!

[Anonymous Coward]

If a refund means Google has to delete everything they know about me and can no longer resell my data to anyone, then sign me up, now.

No

[oGMo]

You mean when they made a search engine? Or a webmail client? Or online maps? Or office apps? Or an RSS reader? Or a calendar? Or a finance site? Or a chat program? Or a photo site? Or an online store? Or a social site? Or a phone OS?

None of these things are "innovations", none of them were particularly innovative, and they weren't doing any of them first (or even early), but in many cases they were better/easier/free-as-in-beer-er than the alternative. Which is fine. And they made money on it. Which is great. And when they stop working (like Reader), we'll find something else, or write something else. Since they make getting your data out pretty easy, that's not even hard.

And if you've become complacent where if Google doesn't offer it, you can't find it, that's not innovation... that's you being lazy. And it's not their fault, it's yours.

Re:No

[greenfruitsalad]

i read about 'glass' about 13 years ago in a short story in a scifi magazine. but it was way more advanced. it also created persistent overlays of the real world and communicated with other 'glasses'. e.g. if i told my 'glass' to put a watch on my wrist, others with 'glass' could see it on my wrist too. same for a virtual picture on a bedroom wall, etc.
the story unfortunately isn't in english http://www.scifi.sk/poviedky/80/Juraj_Andrassy-Ruzove_okuliare.html

Re:No

[__aaltlg1547]

There's a difference between writing scifi and making technology that works. The former is imagination. The latter is innovation.

If you want an example of Google being innovative, though, look at their self-driving cars. A lot of people have tried to crack that problem. Google actually did it.

Re:Cloud This!

[Proteus]

Well, Google's interest is certainly in getting data; but they wouldn't be able if there weren't a market for it. Why? I don't just use one device, so I want easy, transparent access to my data no matter what I'm using. And some of my devices are quite tiny; I don't want to lose my data when I lose my device, so I'd at least want some kind of automatic remote backup...

Not to mention that things like Evernote do a lot of processing on the data you send them that would be onerous on a portable device. For example, if I snap a pic of a business card, the text on that card is OCR'd and made searchable. That would suck hard on a phone; it's much easier to offload that capability (and corpus!) to the cloud. This saves me precious battery and improves the quality of my results.

The issue isn't network-based computing, it's that we don't have the controls in place to assert control of our data on a provider's equipment; we are forced to trust that they won't do Bad Things. And that's a problem.

Isn't this just Google Notebook?

[Proteus]

I mean, a slightly different interface, but substantially the same. And Google killed that product; why do we think this time around will be better?

Re:I thought Google Kept Everything

[MrEricSir]

Except for their products. They don't seem very interested in keeping those around.

Re:screw google!

[Archangel Michael]

If you read the blurb, this is not really a "new" product, but rather an extension of Google Drive. If you use Google Drive, you already have the product.

http://drive.google.com/keep

Since they have now have "Find" and "Keep"....

[mark-t]

All they need now is services called "Lose" and "Weep".

Re:Fool me once... don't get too comfortable

[joh]

Yeah, but let me tell you that users who used Google Reader are those who read and write a lot. Each of them is easily worth 10 plain users. I was burned by that and right now I'm busy moving quite a few users and one business away from Google. Google kicking out ActiveSync and in six months CalDAV isn't exactly helping them here. Google is starting to feel somewhat uncomfortable all of a sudden. There has been a widely felt uncomfortable feeling about Google's potential to abuse their power for quite a while but all of this is the first time Google makes this potential into something you have to deal with. And this is not a good feeling.

Google is changing right now. Even those working there notice that. Google is dropping right now all the attributes that made nerds comfortable with it. It is turning into something else.

Re:Cloud This!

[shutdown -p now]

I was commenting on the fact that keeping things in sync between many devices could be done with a floppy disk as early as 1982,

You're clearly either being intentionally obtuse, as GP noted, or else you have such poor reading skills that you didn't notice or understand the word "automatically" that was there in his comment.

My privacy is worth rather more than the convenience of "keeping notes automatically in sync between many devices."

So don't use it. A lot of people, myself and GP included, don't care about the privacy of simple notes while preferring the convenience of auto-sync. This service is for us. With your priorities, it's clearly not for you. Yet you were the one coming out to question other people's choices. Insulting, indeed.

You got it.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you really want Google to delete everything they know about you, go to accounts.google.com and click the link that says "Close account and delete all services and information associated with it."

Google already cannot resell your data to anyone. You made that part up.

Misguided fanboism

[tanveer1979]

Whenever google is criticized for yanking a "free" service, such comments come up. but is anything from google free? Sure its may not ask for money, but in google your eyeball is the product, and they make money from ads.
Lets take gmail.
Now its free. If google yanks it, many people will troll "it was free" "ask for a refund".
But when I open gmail, I see ads. So in a way google is making money.
No company is in it for charity.;
And no company is above criticism. There is nothing wrong to feel bad or criticize the company if it cans a product you were dependent upon. "Ask for a refund" what kind of response is that. And just because its pro google, it gets modded to "insightful"!