One of the most useful features in Google’s AdSense platform – besides allowing publishers like Ausdroid to earn an income – are the mobile apps that allow you to keep an eye on how your revenue is performing.
In great news today, Google has (for some inexplicable reason) decided to end support for the mobile apps, ensuring that they’ll disappear by the end of the year. This, despite Google acknowledging that some 30% of AdSense customers are accessing their data via the mobile apps.
The company has said the replacement offering will be the website, which is a poor substitute – the website is currently pretty useless on mobile, and doesn’t offer widgets to see – at a glance – what your site is doing.
The AdSense team hints at a more interactive — and possibly proactive — experience for the service going forward:
Our vision is an AdSense that does more to keep your account healthy, letting you focus on creating great content, and comes to you when issues or opportunities need your attention.
Frankly, I don’t believe it. Google has a pretty poor track record in this area, killing useful services without necessarily offering a great replacement. This looks like it’ll be another of the same.
With the apps said to be removed from the Play Store by the end of the year, it’s likely that the apps will stop working around that time anyway.
A thoroughly disappointing move from Google, and one that many publishers – us included – will be pretty sad about when it happens.
Agreed. Not sure what google is doing! Why shutdown all your apps?
My two most used & useful apps have been killed by Google this year without replacement, Inbox & trips but this one seems crazy as advertising is the core of their business.