The decision to “end-of-life” a product is never an easy one — especially when a product has been well-received by customers and members of the original team that created it still remember all the blood, sweat and tears that went into it. But, there comes a time when certain products reach the natural end of their “life” and in the case of Yahoo! Web Messenger, we will be discontinuing support for it after November 1, 2011. We’re doing this for two main reasons:
First and foremost, now you can continue to use a Web-based IM experience in Yahoo! Mail: Initially when we launched Yahoo! Web Messenger it was quite popular with a number of folks who didn’t want to install the Messenger client on their computer. Students, travelers and people who frequently used loaner computers understandably didn’t want to bother with the download, but still wanted an easy way to stay connected to their IM friends. Yahoo! Web Messenger was a perfect solution. But, thanks to the latest version of Yahoo! Mail launched earlier this year, users can now easily IM and SMS with Yahoo! Messenger in Yahoo Mail with only a web browser, centralizing their emails, IMs, and SMS messages in one easy location. This feature in Yahoo! Mail made Yahoo! Web Messenger somewhat obsolete.
Consolidate resources to deliver a best-in-class instant messaging experience: Today Yahoo! supports Messenger on the Windows PC desktop client, Mac and mobile and tablet devices, including iPhone, iPad, Android smart phones and RIM devices to name a few. We’re seeing an increasing number of users on these products and we’re working hard to continually improve and enhance the innovative aspects of Messenger like gaming and video calls. By discontinuing support of Yahoo! Web Messenger, we’ll be able to reallocate resources to develop cool, new features for Messenger.
For all of the Yahoo! Web Messenger users out there, we encourage you to download the desktop client and see some of the enhanced features like chat with your Facebook friends. For those of you who don’t want to (or can’t) download Messenger on your computer, click here to find out how to use Yahoo! Messenger in Yahoo! Mail.
We will be performing maintenance on chat rooms in Yahoo! Messenger on Sept 15th 2011, from 1130am to 1230pm PST. During this period, the chat rooms will be unavailable.
We are committed towards improving the performance of our services and your continued patience is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
We know it’s important for you to stay connected with friends and family no matter where they are in the world. At times, the person you are connecting with may not necessarily be familiar with instant messaging services, that’s why Yahoo! Messenger allows you to make both local and international calls to their landlines or mobile phones at affordable rates.
We’d like to invite you to participate in a quick poll so that we can better understand how regularly you are using the feature:
Hello iOS users, we know how important it is for you to stay available to your friends and continue your conversations while you are on the go. The latest update to the Yahoo! Messenger app for iOS allows you to stay signed in to your chats on your desktop PC computers, Android mobile phones and now, iDevices at the same time! You get notified about new messages where you are active which means you never have to miss a conversation.
Along with this update, we took the opportunity to add premium voice out to iPad.
At Yahoo! we are committed to deliver the best-in-class messaging experience. Download the latest version today and let us know what you think. Enjoy!
If you’re purchasing a shiny new Macbook with the latest OSX Lion just released you’ll find a seamless integration with some of your favorite Yahoo! products. On OSX Lion, the first time you open up your Mail application, Lion will ask if you’d like to setup your Yahoo! account. Once set up, you will have access to your Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! Contacts, Yahoo! Calendar, and Yahoo! Messenger (embedded in iChat) services. Here’s a bit more details on how the individual Yahoo! products play with the new operating system:
Yahoo! Mail: Send mail to your friends directly from Apple’s Mail application. With our Mail service you can access your entire Mailbox and carry it anywhere you go. Read email on the web, on your phone, or on your Macbook and they all stay in sync.
Yahoo! Contacts: Yahoo! is the only partner that supports the tight Contacts service integration with OSX. All the Contacts in your Yahoo! Addressbook automatically flow down to your Macbook. The Contacts you add to your Apple address book are automatically backed up to Yahoo.
Yahoo! Calendar: Using Yahoo! Calendar with Apple’s iCal service enables you to streamline your life effortlessly. Share calendars with your family and stay in sync with them across your Apple devices or other Yahoo! Calendar enabled devices.
Yahoo! Messenger: Quickly chat real-time with your friends using Apple’s iChat product shipped with OSX. See which of your Yahoo! Messenger friends are online and reach out to them right from your computer.
Setup Yahoo! services on OSX Lion and instantly make your Macbook yours. Carry your information anywhere you go, and never lose your data backed up by Yahoo’s cloud services.
