Today, Yahoo!Mobile SVP David Ko introduced the company's new mobile homepage calling it "the world's most advanced mobile homepage."
At once rich and simple, the new homepage is accessible by more than 1,900 different mobile devices, which Yahoo! says represents a 500 percent increase since the mobile site launched in April. We checked out the site on a BlackBerry Storm tonight and were impressed by the features Yahoo! is offering for discovery and filtering of content. From tech-related videos to dynamically refreshed news feeds, Yahoo! gives mobile users plenty of room to play.
Yesterday's phishing attack in which several thousand Hotmail username and password combinations were leaked to the web now appears to be just the beginning of a massive phishing attack affecting users of multiple webmail services including Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, Comcast, and Earthlink. The original list was posted anonymously on pastebin.com, a site generally used by developers sharing code snippets. Again, that site recently saw the addition 20,000 more login details from other webmail service providers, indicating what may the largest scale phishing attack to date.
The Yahoo! Developer Network blog has a post today calling for "innovative and flawless" applications to be submitted for inclusion in a gallery section on their redesigned homepage.
Apps are to be built using Yahoo!'s proprietary development platform, YAP. The YDN post further noted, "We're working on an array of additional developer monetization opportunities - these will be available soon." The gallery's inaugural class includes YAP-built applications from Mint, Lumosity, Flixter, Target, and WordPress.
Early this morning Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz rang the NASDAQ opening bell in honor of her efforts at New York's Advertising week. Said Bartz, "Yahoo is where half a billion people come every month. They come to be entertained, they come to be informed, they come to talk to their friends and their business associates. In other words, Yahoo is the center of people's lives. That is what we are." Bartz's words are significant as the company is expected to unveil a $100 million dollar "It's You!" campaign tomorrow morning.
Earlier this morning, Yahoo's own Flickr app finally appeared in the iTunes App Store, but this was only the first of three mobile apps Yahoo released today. In addition to Flickr, Yahoo Finance and Yahoo Fantasy Football have now arrived in the store as well. In their respective categories, Yahoo Finance and Fantasy Football are the #1 players and these apps should help Yahoo to stabilize this position. In addition to these iPhone apps, Yahoo is also launching new mobile sites and BlakckBerry apps for both services.
Well, that certainly took long enough. Despite being one of the most popular photo-sharing web sites on the net today, Flickr hasn't had an official presence in the iTunes App Store until now. The company has just launched their new iPhone application, available here, which lets you both browse and upload photos and videos from your handset.
When 20-year-old college student Firas Alkhateeb posted a picture of President Obama decked out in Joker facepaint to photo-sharing website Flickr, little did he know that he was going to be the catalyst for a major policy change in how the Yahoo-owned company will handle copyright infringement claims. However, that's exactly what happened. Thanks to massive outcry from the online community, Yahoo's legal team allowed Flickr to put the photo's web page back up. Not the image itself, mind you, but the photo's page...along with all its accompanying metadata like date posted, tags, and most importantly, user comments.
Yahoo announced its acquisition of Maktoob today in a deal meant to improve programming in areas like the United Arab Emirates and Jordan. Wrote VP of Emerging Markets Keith Nillson, "We're committed to responsible global engagement. This means being sensitive to local laws, customs, and norms." As critical thinkers, are we going to sit back in our English-only culture bubbles or do we also want a taste of that global engagement? If you're a Firefox user and you're interested in accessing foreign language sites, you may want to try the Worldwide Lexicon's new Universal Translator Toolbar.
During a press conference today, Yahoo announced a large number of updates to Yahoo Mail, Search, and Messenger. Yahoo Mail, for example, will now feature status updates from a user's friends on its homepage. Yahoo Search will also receive a major redesign in the near future. Even though Yahoo will obviously switch to Microsoft Bing soon, Yahoo wants to align the look and feel of its homepage and search application. In the process, Yahoo will now also highlight more of its search services, including Search Monkey, right on its search results pages.
Yahoo has just launched Yahoo Deals, a site that offers coupons, deals and shopping related tips in a searchable format. According to the release, "web searches for "printable coupons" on Yahoo! are up 50 percent in 2009, compared to the same time in 2008, and up 135 percent compared to 2007." As mainstream news readers abandon their print subscriptions for online news sources, Yahoo's alternative form of coupon clipping is likely to increase brand loyalty and help families weather the recession.
