Editor’s Note: At the end of this month, Yahoo has indicated they will be launching a comprehensive social network service called Yahoo 360.
Yahoo To Introduce Social Networking Service
The service will give Yahoo members a place to create personal blogs, which can be shared with others. Members can also share digital photographs, favorites lists and interlink with other members’ blogs. Essentially, Yahoo 360 gives members features that are similar to Orkut and Friendster. The difference being Yahoo 360 is tailored for current and future Yahoo members.
In today’s issue, we offer 3 different looks at Yahoo’s upcoming launch from Neville Hobson, Steve Rubel, and Nick Wilson, but the question remains:
How useful do you find social networks? Are you a member of any specific brand and if so, what are your thoughts? Discuss at WebProWorld.
Yahoo To Launch Social Networking Portal
Neville Hobson
A new consumer-focused social networking offering from Yahoo will soon be launched in beta, according to information on the Yahoo website.
Called Yahoo 360, the new service will include a wide range of offerings including blogs and photo sharing. The most interesting aspect of the offering looks to be the way in which all the elements are tightly integrated into a broad social network service where you will be able to easily share and exchange information, chats, files, etc, with family and friends.
Signing up for the service will be by invitation only, according to Yahoo (similar to how Google introduced Gmail).
This looks like the end of any speculation that Yahoo might be interested in acquiring Six Apart for its blogging offerings, especially the hosted TypePad service.
I would imagine that Yahoo 360 will directly compete with MSN Spaces, the social networking/blogging service launched by Microsoft last December.
The only thing I can see with Yahoo’s offering which is a problem is the name: specifically, the ‘degrees’ part (that’s what the little symbol is next to the number). I had to hunt around to type it in this post as it’s not on a standard keyboard – it’s Alt-0176 on Windows keyboard, if you want to know – so I wonder how long it will be before it gets known simply as ‘Yahoo 360.’
For additional info – including mention of a launch date of 29 March – see this post late yesterday by Charlene Li of Forrester Research. See also this report from ZDNet.
Yahoo 360 Fuses Social Networking And Blogs
Steve Rubel
AP reports that Yahoo is preparing to introduce a new service that blends several of its Web site’s popular features with blogging and social networking.
The hybrid service, called Yahoo! 360, won’t be available until March 29, but the promotional web site is live now. I was able to log in to a page with more info using my Yahoo! ID, but was unable to actually try the service. Mike Liedke from AP writes…
The service is designed to enable Yahoo’s 165 million registered users to pull content from the Web site’s discussion groups, online photo albums and review section to plug into their own Web logs, or blogs, the Internet shorthand used to describe online personal journals.
According to the Yahoo 360 splash page…
With Yahoo! 360, you’ll have one place to keep the important people in your life connected to you. And one place for you to stay connected to them.
Easily invite your friends and family…
It’s very easy to plug all of your people in. With just a few clicks you can invite any — or everyone from you Yahoo! Messenger friends list, you Yahoo! Address Book or (after beta) from Microsoft Outlook to connect to you.
This all sounds good. The only downside is that the service is invitation only – much like Gmail, Orkut and Google’s services. Still, I imagine it won’t be that hard to snag an invite. Here’s a rundown of the core features that I pulled from the Yahoo 360 site…
Yahoo! 360 – Blog And Social Networking Tools
Nick Wilson
The AP is reporting Yahoo has finally announced plans to join the blogging and social networking game with Yahoo 360, a mix of tools to be released on March 29th that includes blogging, photo sharing and social networking.
Yahoo is testing the service with a small group of employees, some of whom have been working on the project since last year when the product was operating under the code name “Mingle.”
The service is designed to enable Yahoo’s 165 million registered users to pull content from the Web site’s discussion groups, online photo albums and review section to plug into their own Web logs, or blogs, the Internet shorthand used to describe online personal journals.
Yahoo also is making it easier for the service’s users to connect with others who share common interests and friends – a practice known as social networking. Participants can either choose to open their blogs to the entire world or restrict access to people invited through e-mail.
Meanwhile, Forrester’s Charlene Li talked to Yahoo about the service. Apparently she’s old mates with Julie Herendeen, VP of Network Products at Yahoo! Charlene adds a little more detail to the AP story saying that the new service will essentially comprise of three main components:
- Blogs for Yahoo! users. You’ll be able to control access to the blog by designing how can see which sections. Presumably, this
- The ability to add content from within the Yahoo! network to the personal space. This will primarily include Yahoo! Photos, but also any reviews you’ve written for local businesses, music/movie reviews, and Yahoo! Groups. This will eventually evolve to also include non-Yahoo! network content, presumably through RSS feeds (an extension of Yahoo!’s RSS service available today on MyYahoo!)
- Be able to see reviews from people within your “social network”. This would include music, movie, and even local business reviews, with the idea that you trust the reviews more from people that you know. It’s a little unclear at this point (I was being briefed right before getting on a flight) whether this feature will be available with the launch or in a later edition.
Maybe come March 29th we’ll finaly find out if rumours of a Flickr purchase are true or not as we find out exactly how photos fit into this mix…
Ok, where’s my damn invite then?
Chris Richardson is a search engine writer and editor for Murdok. Visit Murdok for the latest search news.
