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Comment by runako | Hacker News Reader

3 months of warning for the shutdown of a product with no drop-in alternatives is really an insult. Look closely at the migration page (https://support.urbanairship.com/customer/portal/articles/31...) and you'll get a sense of the effort to replace SimpleGeo. For instance, the recommendation for users of the Context product is to read the Wikipedia page on R-trees, then download various census etc. data to replicate the functionality in-house.

This isn't about users being too lazy to switch to option B, this is about SimpleGeo building an innovative service and then abandoning its paying users.

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Can't say I agree with you about us "abandoning" our users. SimpleGeo was acquired by Urban Airship and the decision was made to discontinue the service. Disappointing, sure.

I think you just disagree with my choice of words. But to the extent that a Web business can abandon its customers, this is what it looks like.

That's just passing the buck, and besides, "you" didn't abandon SimpleGeo users, UA did.

I don't see how your comment explains anything or makes it seem better. You sold the company to a company that wasn't committed, and your users are suffering for it.

I like that phrasing, "The decision was made." Like it was an unstoppable edict from God himself. I can't speak for anyone else but I never support the future endeavours of a dev that treats me like that.

I'm your customer, and if you sell me to another organization you better make damn sure that organization has my interests at heart, or you'll never see me as a customer again. YOU dropped the ball. Passing the buck only makes you feel temporarily better, it doesn't actually make anything better.

   SimpleGeo building an innovative service and then abandoning its paying users

well, that's what companies do when they fail, go out of business, or are acquihired, ie a business failure by another name

No, that's what Urban Airship decided to do with the service they bought. We're dealing with the only continuing entity in the equation here, Urban Airship, which is not going out of business. Urban Airship is making the decision to abandon their customers (they bought them) in a crappy manner.

Without working at Urban Airship or SimpleGeo (or being close to someone who does), how would one know that when Urban Airship said they were excited to acquire SimpleGeo to continue improving the service that it was BS, and that the search for a replacement should have been started?

More to the point, a more trustworthy company would comport in such a way that its paying customers don't need to know the difference. In this case, that might mean open sourcing components or giving enough notice that their customers could reasonably transition. A link to the R-Tree wikipedia page is not what I'd expect from a reliable vendor.

> how would one know that when Urban Airship said they were excited to acquire SimpleGeo to continue improving the service that it was BS, and that the search for a replacement should have been started?

As a reader of HN, one would expect that acquired products are almost always shuttered within a year. Customers that didn't have year-ahead contracts are exposed to that high-probability risk.

Urban Airship "bought" SimpleGeo, a failed service. Where "bought" means forcibly swallowed it based on VC pressure.

Anyone with half a clue could have seen this coming a mile away.

Why would you spend time and effort developing a failed product you didn't create when your highly successful product is your main focus?

Move along, nothing to see here.

People probably developed for the API before SimpleGeo was in trouble. Those who already invested in the API hoped that UrbanAirship would continue the SimpleGeo brand, perhaps with better management. It would appear that UrbanAirship spent a couple million just to try & snag customers.

Essentially they've punched a hole in the SimpleGeo life raft & are offering parachutes & life raft building instructions to the now drowning customers. Some will be hostile to these actions.

@foobarbazetc: you seem to know an awful lot about the SimpleGeo acquisition. Which VCs were forcing Urban Airship to do the deal?

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