Google recently announced that it would be closing its free online news-reading app Google Reader. Now, the company is releasing another free app known as “Google Keep.”
The note-taking app works with Android smartphones and tablets that run on Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) or any later version.
Google Keep has been generating a lot of talk since its announcement for several reasons, not least of which for its incomplete integration with Google’s other services such as Google Drive.
The most popular note-taker on the market today is Evernote, so Google already has steep competition, causing many to question the reasoning behind creating and releasing such an app.
There is reportedly no way the company will make money from the app, and Google has not yet spoken on how long the app will be offered. As Google has a history of closing its apps, this has made many wary of even starting to use it.
In general, the idea is smart and comprehensive enough that it should work well and gain interest, but Google may be playing a losing game with this one. Google Keep offers no desktop app, a feature that its competitor Evernote does include, but Google allows the notes (which range from standard post-it style notes to lists, photos and voice recordings) to sync with Google’s Keep Web browser, drive.google.com/keep.
Several notable figures in the Android sphere including Android Police’s Ron Amadeo have noted that Google has created a free note-taking app before, Google Notebook, which the company closed in 2009.
It is also strange that Google Keep does not work with Google+ in any way, so the plan behind this release is hard to gather.
If Google continues to create free apps that do not somehow generate ad money for the company, it is likely they will continue to close them, which doesn’t bode well for the popularity of whatever new free app they put out.
Edited by
Brooke Neuman 
QUICK LINKS 
