*** begin quote ***
The AT&T Photo Storage app was discontinued on October 20, 2025. To ensure your treasured memories are safe, please make sure to retrieve your stored photos and videos before February 1, 2026.
*** end quote ***
the AT&T ashcan!
Of course, no reduction in price. Argh!
#AT&T_ashcan, #Google Graveyard
Technology’s version of shrinkflation!!!
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Leave a Comment » | 
Technology | Tagged: #AT&T_ashcan, #Google Graveyard, Google Graveyard, the AT&T ashcan | 
Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
https://everything.typepad.com/blog/2025/08/typepad-is-shutting-down.html
Typepad is shutting down
August 27, 2025
*** begin quote ***
We have made the difficult decision to discontinue Typepad, effective September 30, 2025.
What Does This Mean for You?
After September 30, 2025, access to Typepad – including account management, blogs, and all associated content – will no longer be available. Your account and all related services will be permanently deactivated.
*** end quote ***
Luckily I chose WordPress and dabbled in Google’s Blogger.
Sad to see these “old” favorites going down. Hope someone saves their content.
:-(
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Leave a Comment » | GRAVEYARD | Tagged: Blooger, Google Graveyard | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Comcast is Shutting Down Its Email Service & Moving Customer Email Accounts to Yahoo Mail
By Luke Bouma on August 2, 2025
*** begin quote ***
In a significant change, Comcast has announced plans to transition all Comcast.net email accounts from its current Xfinity Email platform to the Yahoo Mail platform. The announcement, detailed in an email sent to customers on August 2, 2025, outlines a phased migration set to occur over the next several months, promising improved functionality and advanced features for its users.
According to the email from Comcast, the shift to Yahoo Mail will provide customers with a “premium email solution” designed to streamline communication and organization. Yahoo Mail’s AI-driven inbox management, robust security features, integrated calendar, and highly rated mobile app were highlighted as key benefits of the transition. Importantly, Comcast assured customers that their existing Comcast.net email addresses, along with all messages, folders, and contacts, will remain intact during the move.
*** end quote ***
FYI Yahoo is primarily owned by Apollo Global Management, which holds a 90% stake, while Verizon retains a 10% ownership. The company operates as a standalone entity under the name Yahoo! Inc. Apollo Global Management is a private equity firm that bought AOL and Yahoo from Verizon.
Way back when I was first reinkefj@att.net and later when I became reinkefj@comcast.net (Are you detecting a pattern here?). I advise family, frends, and basically anyone who would listen that this “free” email was a lock-in so you could never change ISPs. A quick scan of the Reinke Faces Life blog will show you my griping back in 2010.
May I suggest that you have your own domain? The common wisdom, or is that common whizdumb, is to own your own name as a domain name. I own “reinke.cc”. (I like saying “sea sea me at reinke.cc”! me@reinke.cc will actually work!)
It gives one quite a bit of control. And, it’s very cheap. I know three solutions: wordpressdotcom with gmail, email only with 1and1, and domain+email+webspace also at 1and1.
My point is not that you should use 1and1. http://www.1and1.com/?k_id=9113251 I could care less which one you use. It’s that getting on to your own domain with email is cheap and easy.
And, it’s not aol, hotmail, yahoo, or gmail. It IS your own “personal brand”. And, the “bad guys” can’t fool you!
P.S.: 1and1 is now IONOS.
Let’s look over the Google Graveyard for all the vendors who have passed away with our data.
Never mind all the hardware devices that were given the heave ho after being bought by suckers like me.
Soooooo, under the heading of “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me!”, I’d urge you to take firm control of your choices. If your data goes in, then ask how does it come out?” If the answer is not obvious, then tread carefully the data you save may be your own.
Argh!
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Leave a Comment » | DISCOURAGING | Tagged: @att, @comcast, AOL, Apollo Global Management, Google Graveyard, ISPs, Luke Bouma, Verizon, Yahoo | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Dropbox says it’s time to find a new password manager as it prepares to shut down service
By Ryan McNeal 21 hours ago
<< EDITOR ADDED DATE 2025-07-31>>
*** begin quote ***
Dropbox Passwords users will soon have to find a new password manager to store their passwords, usernames, and other sensitive data. The company will be shutting down the service in the next couple of months.
Dropbox has announced that it is preparing to sunset its password manager. According to a help center document, the decision was made so that the company can “focus on enhancing other features in our core product.” The full service is scheduled to be discontinued on October 28, 2025, but the shutdown will be carried out in phases.
*** end quote ***
“Sunsetting”? Argh! Call it what it is “shrinkflation”.
Why they ever pursued it is beyond me.
And, they don’t suggest BITWARDEN which is basically free.
Is OnePassword or Lastpass an affiliate link?
Argh!
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Leave a Comment » | Technology | Tagged: @androidauthority, androidauthority, DROPBOX, Google Graveyard, Ryan McNeal | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Microsoft is killing its ChromeOS competitor:
Back in 2021, Microsoft announced Windows 11 SE as a lightweight platform to rival Google’s ChromeOS, but now, the company is pulling the plug on the offshoot.
Leave a Comment » | Technology | Tagged: Google Graveyard | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Download your photos before AT&T shuts down its cloud storage service permanently
Written by Lance Whitney, Contributor
July 22, 2025 at 8:33 a.m. PT
Reviewed by Elyse Betters Picaro
*** begin quote ***
Starting Oct. 20, 2025, AT&T Photo Storage will stop backing up your files. At that time, the app will be removed from Apple’s App Store and Google Play. The service itself, however, will still remain available until Feb. 1, 2026, at which point your stored photos will vanish as well.
*** end quote ***
Of course, the monthly nut I pat to AT&T will OF COURSE be reduced proportional to the cost of this service.
Yeah, right.
It’s just a technological form of our old friend, SHRINKFLATION!
Back in the day when I worked for Old Ma Bell, no one would dare harm the Customer. It was part of the credo, ethic, or morals of the employees.
Then Judge Green broke up the “monopoly” and the USA went from a stellar phone service to a mixed jumble of offerings. Bell Labs and Wester Electric were fatal casualties of the distruction.
Were phone calls “cheaper”? The phones certainly weren’t a durable and the politicians and bureaucrats ruled “rates” at all levels of Gooferment.
Unfortunately, unlike the leadership of IBM who told the Gooferment to go <synonym for the act of procreation> themselves, Ma Bell just rolled over and played dead.
Roll the clock forward and we have expensive phones and service (such as it is) and the AT&T ASHcan!
Argh!
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Leave a Comment » | Technology | Tagged: AT&T, AT&T ASHcan, cloud, Cloud Storage, Elyse Betters Picaro, Google Graveyard, Lance Whitney, shrinkflation | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
https://www.androidauthority.com/amazon-freevee-app-shut-down-august-3573688/
Amazon’s Freevee app gets an expiry date, but here’s how to keep watching for free
Prime Video is the new home for all of Freevee’s ad-supported content.
By Pranob Mehrotra
July 3, 2025
*** begin quote ***
After announcing plans to wind down its free video streaming service late last year, Amazon has now confirmed that the Freevee app will finally be shut down in August. But there’s some good news for those who enjoy Freevee’s vast library of TV shows, movies, and live TV.
*** end quote ***
Remember if it’s “free”, then you are the product!
Now like the Google Graveyard, we have an “Amazon sunset”!
Amazon’s Dash buttons are no more. Remember the “Tide button”, and other product buttons to make reordering easy? I don’t remember Amazon “sunseting” other things. And certainly not as frequently as Google does.
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Leave a Comment » | Technology | Tagged: amazon, Amazon Freevee, Amazon Sunset, androidauthority.com, Entertainment, Freevee, Google Graveyard, Pranob Mehrotra, Streaming | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
https://developers.googleblog.com/en/google-url-shortener-links-will-no-longer-be-available/
Nie mój cyrk, nie moje małpy . . . literally, “not my circus, not my monkey;” figuratively, “not my problem.” — Polish saying
I guess monkeys are “problems” in Poland, and circuses are where “problems” come from. If it’s not your monkey, and it’s not even from your circus, then it’s not your problem. — https://goo.gl/X7VEKG
# – # – # – # – #
Google URL Shortener links will no longer be available
JULY 18, 2024
*** begin quote ***
In 2018, we announced the deprecation and transition of Google URL Shortener because of the changes we’ve seen in how people find content on the internet, and the number of new popular URL shortening services that emerged in that time. This meant that we no longer accepted new URLs to shorten but that we would continue serving existing URLs.
*** end quote ***
Once again a demonstration of the Internet axiom, “If you’re not paying of a product, then you are the PRODUCT.” Sometimes even if you are paying, it still gets “deprecated” — a fancy word for “FU, we don’t need you”! For example, Pocket from Mozilla. In this case, a service is disappearing.
https://umatechnology.org/what-does-it-mean-when-an-app-gets-sherlocked-by-apple/
Being “Sherlocked” is a term that encapsulates the dramatic and often ruthless dynamics between smaller developers and larger tech companies like Apple. It serves as a reminder of how innovation and competition can shape the tech landscape, sometimes to the detriment of those who initially paved the way.
Not just APPLE, but GOOGLE and MICROSOFT do it as well. Without the decency of acquiring the original developer. Not that “guaranties” the product or service will survive. Some are acquired to kill the competition.
There is no doubt in my mind that Google intended to SHERLOCK BITLY (https://bitly.com/pages/products/url-shortener) but for whatever reason they decided not to. I suspect that there was not margin in it for Google. So after “pushing” it, like so many other GOOGLE “products and services” they give it the FU treatment and “deprecate” it.
Sad for the Users who used it and good for BITLY.
And, for anyone who still “trusts” Gooferment to be a fair referee with respect to anti-trust issues, why do you think “corporations” “contribute” aka payoff politicians and bureaucrats?
Now I have to go and replace all “goo.gl” uses in my blog. Argh!
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Leave a Comment » | DISCOURAGING | Tagged: anti-trust, APPLE, BITLY, GOOGLE, Google Graveyard, Microsoft, SHERLOCK | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
https://www.androidauthority.com/dead-android-apps-3491528/
It’s been years, but I still miss these dead Android apps dearly
Not every great Android app stands the test of time.
By Andy Walker 21 hours ago
<< EDITOR ADDED DATE 2024-10-22>>
*** begin quote ***
I’ve used some great Android apps over the years. Many of these still exist and find a home on my home screen to this day. However, a slew of apps have come and gone. Feeling particularly nostalgic, I donned my rose-tinted glasses and took a longing look back at some of the dead Android apps that I still wish were actively developed, listed on the Play Store, or weren’t shuttered by their owners.
*** end quote ***
Well, before I “invest” my time, attention, effort, and dikw (i.e., data, information, knowledge, wisdom) in any application, I consider that if I am not paying for it, it COULD, and likely will, disappear at the most inconvenient moment in time. And, I could gripe but it would be my own fault.
As an old Info Sec DR practioner, I always worry about backup and recovery (i.e., one is none, two is one, and three is glee). As well as export and import of my data. For example, it does me no good to EXPORT my data if there is no way to or no place to IMPORT it too.
(Anyone ever think of that? Notably my Apple Contacts app and Google Contacts app. Both can export and import but something always prevents it. Argh! My solution is to keep contacts in a note in a NOTEPAD app. PIA to update stuff in THREE places. But, I just shake my head when people complain about losing their data. Or search their call logs and message log to find a long ago contact.)
FWIW YMMV faiwwypfi (Free Advice Is Worth What You Pay For It! ?zero?)
—30—
“A key point to bear in mind: The value of attentiveness varies in proportion to its object. You’re better off not giving the small things more time than they deserve.” — Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
Leave a Comment » | Technology | Tagged: Android Apps, androidauthority.com, Andy Walker, attention, DATA, effort, Google Graveyard, information, knowledge, Time, wisdom | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
https://www.androidauthority.com/when-google-will-break-googl-links-3462692/
General technology
Google’s kiss of death is coming for your goo.gl links
By Mahmoud Itani
*** begin quote ***
In typical Google fashion, the company killed its goo.gl short link generator on March 30, 2019. Since then, users have still been able to access goo.gl links created before the generator’s shutdown. However, this will change next year, as Google will completely sunset the service, breaking the short links in the process.
*** end quote ***
# – # – # – # – #
https://developers.googleblog.com/en/google-url-shortener-links-will-no-longer-be-available/
Google URL Shortener links will no longer be available
JUL 18, 2024
Sumit Chandel Developer Relations Engineer
Eldhose Mathokkil Babu Software Engineer
*** begin quote ***
In 2018, we announced the deprecation and transition of Google URL Shortener to Firebase Dynamic Links because of the changes we’ve seen in how people find content on the internet, and the number of new popular URL shortening services that emerged in that time. This meant that we no longer accepted new URLs to shorten but that we would continue serving existing URLs.
*** end quote ***
And off to the Google Graveyard, it goes.
Unfortunately I was on a kick using them on my blog for a while until for whatever reason, I stopped. Now I had to waste two hours correcting that link headed mistake. Sigh! Some links were broken and one of my favorite authors died unnoticed. But I did find some old forgotten content that made me laugh, cry, and wonder where my skills went. Some of the content was timeless. Me not so much!
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Leave a Comment » | Technology | Tagged: Eldhose Mathokkil Babu, Google Graveyard, Mahmoud Itani, Sumit Chandel | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Hi Ferdinand,
Recently, we announced that Google Podcasts is going away in 2024. In order to ease this transition, you now have access to a tool that allows you to easily migrate your show subscriptions to YouTube Music or to download a file of your show subscriptions, which you can upload to an app that supports their import.
Just like Google Podcasts, with YouTube Music you can listen to podcasts on the go using background play, download podcasts, and more – with no paid membership required.
After March 2024, users in the US will no longer be able to listen to podcasts in Google Podcasts. After June 2024, you will no longer be able to migrate or export your subscriptions.
Please note that in order to access the migration and export tools, you’ll need to be on the latest version of the Google Search and Google Podcasts apps and have a valid account type. If you are not on a supported app version, you will only be able to access migration and export tools on the web version of Google Podcasts. Users on Android and iOS apps who have not updated to the latest version by February will be automatically redirected to the web version of Google Podcasts. Some features are not available in the web version of Google Podcasts, including downloading.
If you have questions, we’re here for you. Check out our support resources.
Sincerely,
The Google Podcasts team
# – # – # – # – #
A technology giant teaches you that “you get what you pay for”.
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Leave a Comment » | GOOGLE | Tagged: Google Graveyard, YouTube Music | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Over three years ago, we launched the Trusted Contacts app as a way to help people stay up to date with their loved ones’ whereabouts. Since then, we’ve built this functionality directly into Google Maps with Location Sharing – making it even easier to share your live location with trusted friends and family.
As a result, the Trusted Contacts app will be removed from the App Store and Play Store today, and will stop being supported after December 1, 2020. If the app is installed on your device, you can continue to use it until then.
If you have created trusted contacts, you can download them from the trusted contacts page until December 1, 2020. After that date, the Trusted Contact app will no longer work and your trusted contacts will be unable to see the live location you are sharing with them from the app.
To learn more about Location Sharing in Google Maps, check out our help center.
# # #
Too bad if you were using it.
You really are NOT in control of your tools.
Makes everything that Google “gives” you for “free” suspect that it won’t be there tomorrow.
Argh!
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Leave a Comment » | Technology | Tagged: Google Graveyard | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
LaCros Will Change the Way We Use Chromebook
September 12, 2020 by Dinsan Francis | Last Modified: September 12, 2020
*** begin quote ***
It will stop getting updates when your Chromebook reaches end of life.
Using a browser that no longer gets software updates is not a safe thing to do. With this change, Google can continue to give you Chrome updates even after stopping support for Chrome OS on your Chromebook.
But that’s not what I am excited about
I use two Chrome profiles on my Mac. One has my personal account. The second profile has the Google account that I use for the blog (Analytics and Search Console, etc).
Whenever I have to switch between these two profiles to complete tasks, I tend to use my Mac. It is not easy to do this on a Chromebook. I cannot switch profiles as I do on my Mac or Windows PC.
*** end quote ***
# – # – # – # – #
Maybe I don’t understand the need for “End of Life” on Chromebooks. I’ve discarded two as my secondary machine to my primary Mac Book Air. I’d have thought that Google had created the computer that was closest to an appliance like a toaster. But they threw in the EOL as planned obsolesce. Such a shame, because the EOL ones still work.
I never saw a need for “profiles”.
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Leave a Comment » | Chromebook | Tagged: Google Graveyard | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
-
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FJohn Reinke
Consultant at Technology Legacies LLC
Advisor, Computer Governance Committee at Manhattan College
Editor / Publisher at Jasper Jottings
Greater New York City Area
JJ Positraction JJ Endnotes Downsize DC
Philosophy of Liberty
I have NOT received any gagged governmental information requests
Reinke Faces Life 