Recently, Google announced that it was depreciating some of it’s APIs (including the very popular Translate API). This announcement was met with a fair amount of flak from the developer community, with people going as far to say that they would never ever use a Google API ever again.
Here’s what I don’t get, people are complaining in spite of the fact that:

1. The APIs are Google’s property. It can do as it wants with them.
2. Most of the people who are crying out against this haven’t contributed in any form to either the API development or maintenance.
3. Almost all the depreciated APIs have replacements.
4. Quite a few of the APIs were still under API Labs – which means that they were experimental.
5. The Termination clause in the Terms & Conditions (which I assume most people expecting to run a business / project based on a API would read) clearly states that Google may terminate the API if, I quote:
   

   the provision of the Services to you by Google is, in Google’s opinion, no longer commercially viable.

6. The Warranty clause in the Terms & Conditions further states that:
   

   IN PARTICULAR, GOOGLE, ITS SUBSIDIARIES AND AFFILIATES, AND ITS LICENSORS DO NOT REPRESENT OR WARRANT TO YOU THAT:

   1. YOUR USE OF THE SERVICES WILL MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS,
   2. YOUR USE OF THE SERVICES WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, TIMELY, SECURE OR FREE FROM ERROR,
   3. ANY INFORMATION OBTAINED BY YOU AS A RESULT OF YOUR USE OF THE SERVICES WILL BE ACCURATE OR RELIABLE, AND
   4. THAT DEFECTS IN THE OPERATION OR FUNCTIONALITY OF ANY SOFTWARE PROVIDED TO YOU AS PART OF THE SERVICES WILL BE CORRECTED.

(Note the emphasis on the ALL CAPS text)
So, given all this, did all those complainers really expect to keep making money off Google’s efforts and data in perpetuity? And is basing a business model on a API, that clearly states that it might vanish overnight, really such a smart idea?

Google also drew a lot of flak for pulling the plug on Translate citing API abuse as the reason. A lot of people felt that, given how “smart” Google was, they should have found some other way round the abuse problem. My take on this is that, people give Google some credit. Given how “smart” they are I’m sure they must have explored all avenues before coming to that drastic conclusion.

I think in the end, its the developer community that needs to shape up and stop having unrealistic expectations of experimental APIs and be ready to change legacy code when API’s depreciate or stop using them. And Businesses need to realize that depending on other companies for core functionality is never a smart move. I’ve already been involved this year with cases that show how both depending on API’s and building missing functionality using API’s can seriously boomerang.

Thats my 10 cents on this issue. What’s your take on it?