It was really inevitable. In the early days of the internet, Tucows was known as a reliable place to find and download new software. Today, however, most people like to use a modern App Store – Microsoft and Apple both run their own – or navigate directly to developer sites. And if you are looking for inspiration, there is always Product Hunt. So Tucows decided to finally shut down Tucows Downloads. “Tucows Downloads is old,” said Tucows CEO Elliot Noss. “Old sites are a challenge for maintenance and therefore a risk.”
It’s a decision the team has been pondering for some time. “We talked earlier about closing the site,” Noss explained. But the history of the site, coupled with a sense of sentimentality, made them wait. In 2016, the company decided to consider Tucows Downloads as a public service, rather than a money maker. This stripped the site of advertising and conceded that the site had ‘become less relevant when we look at the balance sheet’. Now, however, the company is ready to move on. It has enough work as a domain registrar, domain name vendor and the company behind Ting, an internet service provider in the US.