Summary
- Google’s experimental project, Keen, a Pinterest-style platform, is shutting down, prompting users to export their data before March 24.
- Keen offered Machine Learning-powered recommendations for virtual idea boards, but hasn’t seen major updates since 2021.
- Google emailed users to download their content and noted Keen provided guidance for the company’s content recommendation systems.
Alongside its core apps such as Gmail, the Workspace suite, Maps, and apps exclusive to Pixel phones, Google also devotes considerable efforts and resources to experimenting with new ideas for services which could be spun into their own businesses, much like self-driving car company Waymo. However, 2023 was a rough year for Alphabet Inc., and we are still seeing a ripple effect with the latest shutdown of a Pinterest-style social media platform called Keen.
Here’s what Google killed in 2023
All the consumer services Google pried from our hands this year
Keen took off in 2020 as one of Google’s many experimental projects, supported by the company’s idea incubator called Area 120. Operating with the URL StayKeen.com, the platform offered users Machine Learning-powered recommendations and Search results related to Keens — virtual idea boards where you can collect content such as links, images, videos, and notes with a common theme, such as cooking, gardening, housekeeping, etc.
Google’s description for Keen explained that each board would set the foundation for more discovery of related ideas and concepts, and machine learning would help the recommendations improve with time, as you tell the algorithm what you like and dislike. However, the company hasn’t released a major update for Keen since December 2021. Following the shutdown of several other Area 120 projects amid layoffs in 2023, Google has now announced Keen’s shutdown (via 9to5Google).
Google also emailed existing Keen users to export their data and download it as a ZIP file, like you would use Google Takeout. You’re allowed to export all the content you posted, including the links you saved for later, images uploaded, and text notes and posts you made. You can select individual Keens to download at staykeen.com/download. A pop-up on the website also alerts you of the impending shutdown, and is hard to miss. Meanwhile, Google acknowledges that Keen gave Google’s content recommendation systems invaluable guidance that ties recommendations to real-world interests.
You have until March 24 to take your data offline. After the cutoff date, your data will be inaccessible and Google will delete it all — posts, likes, comments, everything. A shutdown like this isn’t uncharacteristic of the company, but we sincerely hope more Area 120 projects aren’t shut down like this in 2024.
