Yahoo acquires flickr
Yahoo actually does acquire Flickr. Dave Winer nails it when he says “[...] it should have been the other way around”, that would be something to get excited about from a user pov, no? Apparently they’re going to increase storage and uploads on free accounts and lower prices on pro accounts which is a good thing i suppose. I’m a little nervous about this nonetheless, ever since they dropped pop3-access on free y!mail accounts i’m a little cautious with anything yahoo. Besides, when you look at what yahoo’s been doing by and large, it looks like they’re trying really hard to get it right, but hardly get it right. Their offerings always seem a little cramped and forced, nothing i’d enjoy using.
The funny thing with yahoo is, whenever i sign up for pretty much anything, yahoo’ll buy it within a year or two. First e-mail account with rocketmail, sure enough they’re acquired by yahoo soon afterwards. First webspace for a website with geocities, sure enough they’re acquired by yahoo soon afterwards. Now the same with flickr. Judging by history they’ll buy del.icio.us sooner than later, you heard it here first.
Anyone remember passport, microsoft’s failed attempt at a central authentication service? There was a time when i fully expected yahoo to take that role of a central authentication service, simply because they bought any web property worth registering for and consolidated accounts.
I’m with you regarding the problems with using Yahoo. It used to be a respectable search engine, now it’s a conglomerate of any Internet service imaginable, too big to move, so they have to buy other services in order to advance. A recent Wired article compared Yahoo and Google and wondered why Google is favoured by so many tech-journalists, although Yahoo is bigger and has more turn-over. Well, it’s because it manages to stay simple, despite their ever growing list of services. Something Yahoo didn’t manage.
Comment by gibarian on Mar. 23rd, 2005, at 14:56 #
To me the thing with yahoo is, they keep making interesting stuff, they just do it in the least appealing fashion. Horribly cluttered interfaces, forced registration, that kinda thing. Perhaps they should start hiring some top-notch usability- and ux-guys.
As for google, when they started off big a few years back they simply were leaps and bounds ahead of their competition. Now their search is hardwired into our browsers and, more importantly, into our brains. Search == google. Gmail is nice as well, but for anything else google does i have a hard time figuring out any coherent line of development. Besides, they started getting some bad pr lately and their “don’t be evil”-mantra might as well backfire sooner or later.
It looks like yahoo is getting their act together and google’s loosing it. Even though i use google daily and yahoo hardly ever, my money would be on yahoo rather than google right now.
Comment by christoph on Mar. 25th, 2005, at 0:54 #
Ever since Yahoo acquired Geocities and turned it into the evil being it is now, I’ve been of the opinion that any good service placed into Yahoo’s hands won’t be good for long. As for google, well… Everyone is using the internet to make money. Is it all that surprising that either of these services is branching out in areas that aren’t entirely related in their beginnings? Ebay is doing the very same thing. It’s definitely a problem everywhere.
Comment by denise on Mar. 25th, 2005, at 10:01 #
I agree that yahoo has a strong tendency to fuck things up. Their offers appear interesting in theory, but are usually poorly implemented. Nonetheless they’re regaining some cred lately.
As for google, i don’t mind that they’re branching out, i just think some of their stuff is way overhyped. Stuff like gmail, google news or google maps are pretty nifty, but all the hubbub about google suggest? Imho way out of proportion. Overall i have this feeling that yahoo has a stronger vision of where they are going with their endeavors.
Comment by christoph on Mar. 28th, 2005, at 1:00 #
Yahoo! bought Launchcast a few years back and since they took over introduced adverts and subscriber models, plus limited the best bit-rates only to subscribers.
Obviously I know Launch.com was going bankrupt before Yahoo! took over and that streaming that much music (and video) is very costly - but at times Y! almost ruined the service, though it has improved again in recent months.
Comment by Monjo on Jul. 21st, 2005, at 17:46 #