Google Hangouts
Three chat apps in a trench coat.
CAUSE OF DEATH: Split into two products, renamed twice, then shut down in 2022.
Google Talk, Google+ Messenger, Confusion
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Hangouts launched on May 15, 2013 by stitching together Google Talk, Google+ Messenger and a video feature from Google+. It was supposed to tidy things up. In 2016 Google told people to stop using it for text messages. In 2017 it split the brand into Hangouts Meet and Hangouts Chat, then renamed both. The record blames an "increasingly fragmented and non-unified suite of messaging offerings," which is a polite way to describe a company arguing with itself in public. Google shut Hangouts down on November 1, 2022 and moved everyone to Google Chat. For now.