NewsGoogle Changes Plan, Now EtherPad Will be Open Source

Google Changes Plan, Now EtherPad Will be Open Source

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Google ticks off EtherPad customers by purchasing the software product only to turn around and shut it down.

On Dec. 4, it was announced that Google had purchased AppJet Inc. – the makers of EtherPad. Then the next day it was announced that EtherPad would no longer exist and that the development team would be move to Google Wave team.

Needless to say, EtherPad customers were not pleased. EtherPad is an online collaboration tool. It’s like Word but it’s online and more than one person can edit a document simultaneously.

In response the negative customer response, Google turned the service back on and said they’ll open source the EtherPad code.

“Many of you were not super thrilled with the transition plan we announced in our last blog post, which I guess is really quite flattering,” wrote former AppJet CEO Aaron Iba.

Iba said that EtherPad would remain online at least until they could open source the code. And even though Google Wave doesn’t do what EtherPad does, Iba said he’s working with the Google Wave team to give EtherPad customers a chance to preview Google Wave.

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