Google Inc. has temporarily shut down a search engine feature that allows users to find real-time updates from Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed and other social networking sites.
A message posted early Monday on Twitter by the team behind Google Realtime says the search feature has been temporarily disabled while Google explores how to incorporate its recently launched Google+ project into the feature. The tweet tells readers to "stay tuned."
According to a report by
searchengineland.com Twitter and Google entered into an agreement in 2009 for the incorporation of tweets in Google's real-time search product which has now expired.
The report also says that while real time feeds from twitter will remain disabled, Publicly available Twitter information will remain searchable.
The company envisions including Google+ information along with other Realtime data from a variety of sources, said Gabriel Stricker, a Google spokesman.
Google+ is the search giant's latest stab at entering the social networking segment of the Internet. The project was unveiled last week and lets users share things with small groups of people.