Eric Wirttman, CEO of POTI (Pioneers of the Inevitable), which produces the open source media player Songbird, has announced on the Songbird blog that, for financial reasons, Songbird development will cease and POTI will shut down its business activities as of 28 June.

Songbird first saw the light of day early in 2006, as a hybrid browser/media player with a look and feel similar to Apple's iTunes. It exited the alpha phase around two years later with the release of version 0.7. The first big cuts arrived in 2010, when financial constraints caused the company to drop Linux support.

In his blog entry, Wittman thanks the developers, investors, partners and users. The project may be taken forward by independent developers, alternatively a Songbird-based desktop player is available in the form of Nightingale. The source for Songbird is still available, for the time being, from the Songbird download page; it is licensed under the GPLv2.

(fab)