Analysis
 
Google has acquired Picnik, the Seattle based online photo editor. I am a big fan of Picnik and I love the app so much that I have been paying the annual subscription to use the pro features. This news is exciting and my congratulations to the team members of Picnik. In a blog pos t today, they announced the acquisition
And all this leads us to today’s exciting news: we’ve just been acquired by Google! What does this mean for Picnik? It means we can think BIG. Google processes petabytes of data every day, and with their worldwide infrastructure and world-class team, it is truly the best home we could have found. Under the Google roof we’ll reach more people than ever before, impacting more lives and making more photos more awesome.
Here are my initial thoughts on the news
  • This is an awesome news for the Picnik team who recently announced the one billionth edited photo and this acquisition only confirms the awesomeness of their product
  • Picnik already has a deal with Yahoo’s Flickr. I am sure this move will push Flickr away from Picnik and, possibly, more closer to Microsoft
  • Even though Google is a major SaaS player, they don’t have a browser based photo editing software. Their existing desktop application goes against the idea of relying only on SaaS. With Google’s push for Chrome OS, it is only natural that they have a browser based photo editorOtherwise, it will be difficult to gain traction for ChromeOS with consumers without relying on a third party vendor. With Google push against Flash, there is no way they will want to partner with Adobe to offer an online photo editor
  • One of the biggest attractions for me was their browser plugin which lets anyone take any image from any website, edit and save it on their computer or one of the online photo sharing sites. I hope Google will keep this extension as a part of their plans
  • I am hoping that Google will not charge for the pro features and let paid customers of Picasaweb use it for free
Well, I am excited about this acquisition in spite of my concerns about Google’s monopoly like rise. Being an avid Picnik and Picasaweb user, this marriage is really exciting for me. What do you think?
Update: Here is Google’s post welcoming the Picnik team.
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Krishnan Subramanian

Krish dons several avatars including entrepreneur in exile, analyst cum researcher, technology evangelist, blogger, ex-physicist, social/political commentator, etc.. My main focus is research and analysis on various high impact topics in the fields of Open Source, Cloud Computing and the interface between them. I also evangelize Open Source and Cloud Computing in various media outlets, blogs and other public forums. I offer strategic advise to both Cloud Computing and Open Source providers and, also, help other companies take advantage of Open Source and Cloud Computing. In my opinion, Open Source commoditized software and Cloud Computing commoditized computing resources. A combination of these two developments offers a strong competitive advantage to companies of all sizes and shapes. Due to various factors, including fear, the adoption of both Open Source and Cloud Computing are relatively slow in the business sector. So, I take it upon myself to clear any confusion in this regard and educate, enrich and advise users/customers to take advantage of the benefits offered by these technologies. I am also a managing partner in two consulting companies based in India. I blog about Open Source topics at http://open.krishworld.com and Cloud Computing related topics at http://www.cloudave.com.

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