14 DAY TRIAL // The Google Maps web-based mapping tool rolled out in November a special function that allows you to call a certain business straight from the interface of the service. The function was only a test according to some sources from Google and was shut down some time ago although the search giant didn't officially announce it. This is another discontinued Google product after the Mountain View company said some time ago that Answers becomes unavailable to all the users. Today's closure was presented by the Google Maps Guide on the Google Groups discussion forum, the company's official saying that it will be replaced by Google Voice Local Search.
Recently, the Mountain View company rolled out a new Russian service that looks similar with the old and closed Answers in a move that seems to revamp the product.
"I'm afraid it's not broken - this feature was a long-running experiment, and in the end it was decided to discontinue it. There are however lots of other features we're adding to maps in the hope of making it even more useful. And if you are in the United States and liked click-to-call, check out a different experiment we're doing (GOOG-411)," the message posted on the Google Groups discussion reads.
However, Google is not even close to its rival Yahoo, the Sunnyvale company that closed an impressive number of products in order to replace them with newer solutions. For example, the giant portal took the decision to close Yahoo Photos, an old photo sharing service and migrate all the users to Flickr, a recently acquired product that offers almost the same functions as the closed solution.
Moreover, Yahoo continued the closure mania with Auctions, a service that was shut down in certain countries but this one wasn't replaced by any other product.