Yahoo! 360° - Y/360 Death Watch

Y/360 Death Watch Full Post View | List View

Now dedicated to complaining about Yahoo's horrible handling of this whole 360 "transition" in the time 360 has left.

Initial Comments on the New Profile Blogging Feature

Two words: it sucks. Among the problems that I noted:

No spell check options
No RSS fees
No blogroll
No tag cloud
No index
Random characters that can't be deleted
Edit a blog post cause all of the text to disappear

On my other profile, I tried the blog import tool. I can no longer tell who made comments on my blog. Pictures don't look right. It is just a mess.

360 is going away and Yahoo simply has no present intention of offering a social networking tool. Yahoo's conduct is unbelievable.

Friday May 29, 2009 - 10:01pm (PDT) Permanent Link | 11 Comments

A Connection Lost

In response to a question from another 360 user, I emailed Matt Warburton last Sunday about the time line for blog feature on the new profile system. You may recall that Mr. Warburton has been the only author writing on the 360 team blog since October 2007.

The email bounced, so i tried another email address that I had for Mr. Warburton. Mr. Warburton replied today that he no longer works for Yahoo and that we would need to read the 360 team blog and the newer profile blog for any updates.

So there you have it. The one connection that we did have to inside information at Yahoo is gone. Moving forward, the only way we'll be able to provide any information will be the same way everybody else will know: Yahoo's own product blogs.

We've been waiting for well over a year for Yahoo to announce something interesting about the profile system. Instead, all we have is a profile system that is a poor imitation of Mash with bits of MyBlogLog and FriendFeed thrown in for good measure.

We will continue to post on this past from time to time if anything significant develops, but there is nothing here that cannot be found elsewhere. It appears that the function this page will be drawing to a close soon.

Tuesday January 20, 2009 - 02:30pm (PST) Permanent Link | 11 Comments

The New Profile System...Some Initial Thoughts

This space used to have a commentary on the new profile system, but Yahoo zapped it. Click here to read a more thorough review by another 360 user.

Thursday October 16, 2008 - 03:46pm (PDT) Permanent Link | 23 Comments

Say Goodbye to Mash

(Yahoo Service logo)

From Carl:

Received via email and posted on the 360 team blog:

Dear Yahoo! Mash member,

Thank you for trying out our Mash Beta service. We hope you had fun with it.

Please note that we will shut down Mash on September 29, 2008. As a result, your current profile on Mash will no longer be available. We strongly recommend that you return to http://mash.yahoo.com and copy the content that you wish to save onto a separate document.

For a list of FAQs, please refer to the Mash Help Page.

Thanks for trying out Mash!

Matt Warburton

Yahoo! Community Manager

______________________________________

From Astra:

Well, folks, it's happened.

After a year (the last eight months of which have been largely a non-event), Yahoo has decided to kill off its 'Mash' product.

Those of you who remember know that 'Mash' created quite a stir last September - it lead to a 1,700-signature online petition (started by Mystie and myself - this blog is actually the outgrowth of that petition).

The petition was mentioned in Wikipedia. However, it did no good, and Yahoo allowed 360 to suffer what might well be recorded as one of the most-undignified demises in cyberspace.

Will we see a 360 replacement? I'm thinking they'll probably not roll anything out until later in the year.

The reason?

It's simple. First, they didn't promise anything until fourth-quarter. (You might remember that prior to their most-recent promise, they promised a replacement in Q1 of '08 - which date unceremoniously came-and-went without so much as a whisper.

Mr. Warburton announced this summer that we'd see a replacement in Q4.

Second, Yahoo is going through some serious internal issues - the departure of key personnel; an attempted takeover by Microsoft, and a lot of other things have kept Yahoo's management pretty busy.

Third, they've never kept a promise related to 360. Why start now?

(Personally, I'm hoping for something decent. They've got some good ideas....)

____________________

(For more information, please go to the 'Mash' blog, located here.

Tags: carl, astra, y-360, yahoo-360, yahoo-mash, mash Thursday August 28, 2008 - 06:43pm (PDT) Permanent Link | 8 Comments

The Fiddle Plays On (Yahoo and the New Profile - An Update)

On the 9^th, true to their word, Yahoo in the person of Matt Warburton) gave us an update.

First off, it took four tries to even read the blog – the database on the 360 servers hasn’t been reindexed in so long (most of you have noticed that when you try to find a post, you’re usually taken to one which predates the one you’ve selected, or get the ‘Cannot Find Server’ message) – this is quite apparently the case with the Yahoo Product Blog itself.

Matt did come out and give us one definitive. “…Here’s the latest news on the transition from your 360 page to your new profile on Yahoo!: It will be taking place sometime in the second half of 2008. We don’t have specifics on the date to share just yet, but you’ll be among the first to know. For now just keep this in mind: 2nd half ’08….” Any idea you might have had that Yahoo was going to stick even remotely to its original date of Q1 ’08 have been thoroughly disabused by that statement.

They’ve got ambitious plans for the new profile – and if you’re not aware of the concepts of Web 2.0, go here and learn - - this article will give you some concepts and theories by which you can frame future discussions.

Yahoo is planning to make some sweeping changes to its profile, which will act as a gateway/portal to all of Yahoo’s services. “…For example, your Profile will be integrated into the new Yahoo! Mail welcome page which will surface messages from the people who matter to you most. Additionally, you will see Updates from your important connections helping you to discover new content and activities in real-time….”

There’s a problem with this, however.

Yahoo ‘overhauled’ their mail service some time ago, and it doesn’t even load half the time when you click on your mail-tool; in fact, the service is now so poor that they actually have a secondary link, which says, “Yahoo Mail seems to be taking some time to load. Click here for Yahoo Mail ‘Classic’.”

Either they know something we don’t, or they’re planning some additional changes to the new Yahoo Mail which will clean up the mess. Otherwise, the overall effect will be like taking a pellet-gun to your light-fixture, then working the switch for half-an-hour, all the while asking yourself “Why doesn’t the light come on?”

While skirting the obvious question (“What happened to your original schedule?”), Matt also went on to offer some quasi-comforting news: “Finally, let’s get down to the nuts and bolts of what this means to you and your 360 account. We’ll migrate your profile photo, your nickname, your friends lists, blog posts and blog comments….”

Well, that’s something.

References:

Web 2.0 (Wikipedia)

Update on Transition and Timing (360 Product Blog; 5/9/08)

Yahoo Rewiring Itself from the Inside Out (CNet News; April; 2008)

Yahoo Open Strategy (Yodel Anecdotal; April, 2008)