Less than 3 months after its official release, and only just over a year since it was released to beta testers, Google has decided to ditch its real-time collaboration tool, Google Wave.

Speaking via the official Google blog, Urs Hölzle, Google's senior VP of operations said:

"We have always pursued innovative projects because we want to drive breakthroughs in computer science that dramatically improve our users’ lives. Last year at Google I/O, when we launched our developer preview of Google Wave, a web app for real time communication and collaboration, it set a high bar for what was possible in a web browser. 

"But despite these wins, and numerous loyal fans, Wave has not seen the user adoption we would have liked. We don’t plan to continue developing Wave as a standalone product, but we will maintain the site at least through the end of the year and extend the technology for use in other Google projects".

When Google Wave was first announced, there was much hype that the service could even take on Facebook and go mainstream to the masses of social web users. However, it has turned out to be a tool that has only been regularly used by a handful of dedicated users (including the Pocket-lint team).

However, we're encouraged by Hölzle's statement that the tech may be used in other Google products. It makes perfect sense for a lot of the features, such as collaboration documents, to be integrated into GMail, and Google could also greatly improve its much maligned Buzz social network service using some Wave features.

Although the web at large hasn't embraced Wave in the way in which Google would have hoped, it is a sad day for its users. But it is a platform that would have only really worked if it reached out to a mass audience, and disappointingly, it never did.

Were you a Waver, or do you think it was always destined to fail? Give us your thoughts using the comments below.