I got this email about an hour ago:

Dear Researchers,

Over the past year, many of you have written to ask about the future of
Google Answers. Today we can finally offer a definitive response: after
four and a half years, we're closing up shop. We considered many factors
in reaching this difficult decision, and ultimately decided that the Answers
community's limited size and other product considerations made it more
effective for us to focus our efforts on other ways to help our users find
information.

So November 30th, 2006 will be the final day that users can post
questions, and December 30th will be the final day that you can post
answers. The existing site content – questions, answers and comments –
will remain posted for now, and while you won't be able to earn money by
answering new questions, we'd like to share with you the AdSense
revenue generated by questions you've already answered; over the next
few weeks, we'll send along more details as to how this will work. Please
feel free to send any further questions to
answers-editors+questionsgoogle.com. We'll try to post the answers to
frequently asked questions to the Google Group so that everyone can see
them.

Finally, we'd like to express our gratitude to all our researchers for your
tremendous contributions and dedication to Google Answers over the
years. Through your passion for research and information, you've built a
service that has been of great benefit to thousands of web surfers as well
as the group of loyal Answers fans who've contributed regularly to the
site. We hope you'll continue to work to help make the world's information
more accessible, and we'll strive to do the same.

Sincerely,

The Google Answers Team

They just put up a farewell on the Google blog a few minutes ago, too.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/11/adieu-to-google-answers.html

I wonder if they have something else planned up their sleeve...

They do not even link to Google Groups as an alternative... strange..

Is this the first service Google's stoped (exept the Labs Voice search thingy)

What did I tell you? I knew this would happen. It can't compete with the likes of Yahoo Answers.

they've probably decied to concentrate on google Q&A in the web results.

I'm hoping that they leave the questions up at least, in some form or another. I'm uncomfortable with "existing site content – questions, answers and comments –
will remain posted for now". There's some good information on there that you won't find anywhere else.

> Is this the first service Google's stoped

Google X comes to mind... that site was removed shortly after launch, for unrevealed reasons.
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2005-03-16-n89.html

At other times, they just stop a feature, like the whois onebox they once had.

Keep Google Answers Alive

http://www.petitiononline.com/ganswers/

   To: Google

   The Google Answers service has helped many people during its four and a half years of existence, and it continues to do so. Researchers and unpaid commenters formed a community which should not be discarded lightly. Many repeat users were able to easily find answers to difficult questions thanks to the service. Furthermore, Google Answers proved that a living could be made working on the Internet alone, as many researchers worked on the site as their sole source of income.

   We, the undersigned, believe that Google should continue to provide this valuable community service to the Internet.

   Sincerely,

   The Undersigned

In this post we take a look at:

1) Google Answers history

2) This is not the first time a large engine has shutdown a QnA service

3) Offer a look at the many QnA services (free) that libraries offer 24x7 from any web computer. From the Library of Congress to the State of California to the UK to Australia.

4) Point out a comment from Google's Marissa Mayer about her take on Google services. She told BusinessWeek earlier this year that some 60 to 80% of Google's products many eventually shutdown.

http://www.resourceshelf.com/2006/11/29/google-saying-goodbye-to-google-answers/

The stories about Google Answers have awful titles:

http://aycu15.webshots.com/image/6614/2004745962468674902_rs.jpg