It’s official.

The deal that was deemed a ‘non-starter’ by opponents back in April is now officially deemed inadequate by Google rivals. This time though it appears they actually had something to read vs. just complaining about what was rumored. At least that’s a step in the right direction….. I think.

Of course, those complaining are the same who have been making these claims against Google (otherwise known as ‘advertising through litigation’ or ‘we can’t do anything ourselves so we will force people to know about us by whining’ approach). At least that’s what we think since the Financial Times reports gives an indication of just how spineless these opponents actually are.

Another rival, which declined to be named, attacked the concession as producing “orphan links” that would be too small and lacking in detail to attract much traffic.

Google is taking this whole streamlining thing quite seriously.

The latest ‘victim’ is their SMS Search product which allowed users to conduct a search by text message.

Ghacks reported

Many users of the service are reporting that the service has apparently been shut down by Google this night. When they send a search term to Google’s SMS Search number, 466453, they get the following response:

SMS search has been shutdown. You can continue to search the web at google.com on any device

TechCrunch also reported

People began to notice the service stop working on Friday, and asked about it in one of Google’s Product Forums (good thing those haven’t been closed down yet) and on Reddit. Jessica S., a Google employee, set the record straight: