Google, which never, ever kills products, just did the equivalent of taking Froogle out back and shooting it in the head. As Steve Rubel noticed yesterday, Froogle was taken down off the Google home page and replaced with Google Video.

Hitwise shows exactly what happens to a site when it’s removed from, or added to, the Google home page. Google Video soars, Froogle plummets.

Google Video is also testing out new YouTube-like features (screen shot here). We sure don’t see this kind of product attention showered on Froogle.