The service of Trutap is down
Yesterday, I wanted to try Trutap, a Java ME social networking client, on my mobile phone again, as I am in favor of its posting blog from Java mobile phones feature. But I just could not connect to their server to get online. Then I found that their website was not accessible also. After searching via Google, I realized that the service of Trutap may be discontinued.
In fact, there had been already news about Trutap’s funding trouble since end of last year. The company had laid off 80% of its employee about 1 year ago and only kept skeleton staff to maintain the service. This explains why there was no new release of Trutap after version 2. But today, it seems that even the service and website have gone. Though I am not a real fan of Trutap, I still feel sorry for that.
This is not a individual case but an example of many startup companies may end up with. Unlike normal software, which are still usable even their developers drop the maintenance, mobile apps such as Trutap are reply on server side service. Well, the users number of Trutap never had exceed 250k. The disappearing of Trutap is not a real big deal. However, there are more applications like Fring or Nimbuzz, which have much bigger users base but no clear mode of making profit yet. The uncertainty of those excellent mobile application companies’ future make me a little bit uncomfortable since I am already used to their services.
We are more and more reply on sever side technology such as cloud computing especial in mobile application domain. Look at the trouble sidekick users had with the server failure, maybe we need better way to safeguard our personal mobile data.