Jaiku is Twitter’s eternal competition. As you know it was bought by google in October 2007.

I always preferred the latter one and I still insist it is better quality, but Twitter has a share of the grand mass, “developments community” and most of all your contacts.

These days Google is releasing ballast(my stocks are going up the creek) and, amongst other services, of which we will also speak, Jaiku will close.

It’s a half closure, in reality it will close as a service but will enable the latest version in open code for the community.

It literally is the “latest version” , because they wont improve or update it, that is up to the developers that wish to so and I think they will, without a shadow of a doubt. When this happens I bet this will be the best  self hosted microblogging platform.

This news leaves me with a bitter taste in my mouth, its great for the freedom but bad for the closure of the service.

I’m sure you will agree with me that Google could have done more for Jaiku. The purchase reminds me of the domain purchases I sometimes do,  following an entrepreneurial impulse that diminishes as time passes.

With the financial clout they have always had, their technical capacity to improve it and their influence, they could have made Jaiku the microblogging leader. This clarifies the predictions that point towards Google purchasing Twitter in 2009.