My Yahoo

My Yahoo! was a start page or web portal that combined personalized Yahoo! features, content feeds, and information. The site was launched in 1996[2] and was one of the company's most popular creations.[3] It was discontinued in December 2024 amid words of protest among users.[4]

Applications of My Yahoo

My Yahoo’s purpose was to have users personalize their pages.[5]

The appearance, layout, and content of the main Yahoo homepage was standard, but My Yahoo offered customization.[6] On it, users could apply themes, add sites, add widgets, rearrange the layout, and add tabs to the page.[7]

A My Yahoo page allowed access to almost everything needed on one page. For example, applications and programs that allowed access to social networking, Lottery numbers, a mail aggregator, a news aggregator, gaming applications, etc...[8] The goal was to give people access to everything they were interested in on a single page.

Users were able to link to Yahoo! Answers.[9]

Provided the option to link Yahoo Local. Enabled local search capabilities.[10]

In 2011, they created a mobile app.[11]

In 2024, Yahoo! announced that My Yahoo! will be shut down and will be replaced with a new service without RSS feeds. The shutdown appears to have taken effect as of December 11, 2024.

RSS features

  • 52% of My Yahoo users are aware of RSS tools and 39% use RSS tools.[12]
  • Many websites had an “Add to My Yahoo” button to make adding an RSS feed to My Yahoo simpler.[13]

Criticism

My Yahoo couldn't consolidate different feeds resulting in the need for multiple streams.

Since the September 2013 redesign, users had complained of numerous issues:

On 24 August 2017, many users reported that all RSS feeds stopped working.[14][15][16]

  • 1) Font size was too large and couldn't be changed
  • 2) Applications were less configurable
  • 3) Weather app used auto-locate instead of remembering a specified place
  • 4) Column resizing was no longer allowed
  • 5) Forced inclusion of a large Yahoo search bar

See also

  • iGoogle
  • My Excite
  • My Lycos
  • MSN

References

  1. Yahoo! Inc. - Company Timeline Wayback Machine, 2008-07-13, retrieved 2016-07-19^
  2. Yahoo! Inc. - Company Timeline Wayback Machine, 2008-07-13, retrieved 2016-07-19^
  3. Saul Hansell. On My...yahoo; David Filo The New York Times, 1999-10-31^
  4. MSN www.msn.com, retrieved 2025-02-06^
  5. Craig Kanalley. Yahoo Homepage Goes Social With Facebook-Personalized Streams Huffington Post, 2013-02-21, retrieved 2013-04-18^
  6. Difference between Yahoo! homepage and My Yahoo! Yahoo, retrieved 2014-04-13^
  7. Overview of My Yahoo Yahoo, retrieved 2014-04-13^
  8. My Yahoo! Blog My Yahoo, retrieved 2013-04-18^
  9. Marc. The Only 7 Things Yahoo Does Better than Google Marc and Angel Hack Life, 2007-07-07, retrieved 2013-04-18^
  10. Marc. The Only 7 Things Yahoo Does Better than Google Marc and Angel Hack Life, 2007-07-07, retrieved 2013-04-18^
  11. My Yahoo! Blog My Yahoo, retrieved 2013-04-18^
  12. Joshua Grossnickle. RSS—Crossing into the Mainstream marketingsherpa.com, retrieved 2013-04-18^
  13. QUICK TIPS: Quickly browse sites with MyYahoo!'s RSS parser (Mac OS X 10.1 and later) PorQuest Computing^
  14. No RSS feeds loading Yahoo! Help Coimmunity, Yahoo!, retrieved 24 August 2017^
  15. RSS feeds not working: Forbes and Wired Yahoo! Help Community, Yahoo!, retrieved 24 August 2017^
  16. RSS Feeds Yahoo! Help Community, Yahoo!, retrieved 24 August 2017^