[NEWS] Google sells SketchUp

[Doug Armand]

I'm not a Sketchup user and most of you probably already know this but for those who don't:

http://news.yahoo.com/google-actually-s ... 50542.html

[Whaat]

Yeah, I found out yesterday morning. I was surprised but yet not so much. I don't think Google had much use for SketchUp anymore since streetview came along.

I'm quite optimistic about the change. When Google bought SketchUp, many were scared and thought they would ruin it. Instead it grew immensely popular, but at the expense of a stifled development that favored primarily Google Earth and 3D Warehouse integration features instead of catering to the core professional users.

Trimble is being perceived by some as a stuffy corporate engineering-like company (just look their website) but I think part of the reason they purchased SketchUp is to help change this image and also integrate SketchUp with their other assets.

I really don't expect any major changes to impact SketchUp for quite awhile. After all, they would have over 30 million angry users to deal with if they did something stupid. The core SketchUp team is heading over to Trimble and they are very excited so that makes me excited too.

You can read a lot more reactions in this thread:
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtop ... 15&t=44881