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Tag: Yahoo

  • Yahoo Plans to Lay Off 1,000 Now, 600 Later

    Yahoo Plans to Lay Off 1,000 Now, 600 Later

    Yahoo is preparing for a round of layoffs, with plans to eliminate 1,000 jobs now and up to 600 in the second half of 2023.

    First reported by Axios, Yahoo’s layoffs will impact roughly 20% of the company’s workforce. Unlike many of the tech industry’s recent layoffs, Yahoo CEO Jim Lanzone said the decision was not a result of financial issues, but is simply part of a larger restructuring.

    “The moves are meant to simplify and strengthen the good parts of the business, while sunsetting the rest,” Lanzone said.

    As part of the company’s restructuring, Yahoo will be shutting down portions of its advertising business, which has long been outclassed by both Google and Meta. As a result, while the rest of the business is quite profitable, the advertising business has increasingly been an anchor that is dragging the company down.

    “A lot of resources were going into that unified stack without a return,” Lanzone added. “This was a longstanding issue with every variation of this company … that needed to be solved eventually.”

    Lanzone says the move will be “tremendously beneficial for the profitability of Yahoo overall,” and will help the company “to go on offense” in more profitable areas.

    The move comes at a time when Yahoo is teasing a return to the search market, so it will be interesting to see if getting back to the company’s roots is an area where Lanzone plans “to go on offense.”

  • Google Won the Search Wars, but Can It Win the AI Search Wars?

    Google Won the Search Wars, but Can It Win the AI Search Wars?

    Google is the undisputed leader in the search industry but is now facing new challenges that threaten its dominance.

    According to the latest statistics, Google currently holds roughly 93% of the global search market. Its closest rival, Bing, holds a mere 3%. Yahoo comes in a little over 1%, and other search engines don’t even break single-digit percentages.

    Despite its dominance, however, Google’s search business is facing an existential threat, the likes of which it has never faced before — artificial intelligence. Just as Google’s search algorithms upended the market and killed off Alta Vista-style category searching, AI is poised to eliminate traditional search that returns pages and pages of links. Instead, AI can provide answers in a conversational manner much more akin to how human beings communicate.

    Enter ChatGPT

    While conversational AI has been a dream of many for years, OpenAI’s ChatGPT took the world by storm, offering the most advanced interpretation of the technology to date. Almost overnight, ChatGPT was being used for everything from writing letters to authoring papers to helping students with their schoolwork.

    ChatGPT was so successful that it caused something of a panic within Google as industry experts predicted the tech’s ability to put an end to traditional search. The potential wasn’t lost on Google’s rivals either, with at least a couple of them announcing plans to roll out AI-powered search.

    The Frontrunner: Microsoft

    Microsoft has quickly emerged as the biggest threat to Google’s search. In addition to being its biggest rival — albeit a very distant one — Microsoft is one of the main investors in OpenAI, the firm behind ChatGPT. In fact, the Redmond-based company just signed a multi-year, multibillion-dollar investment in OpenAI, extending a partnership that gave it exclusive access to some of the AI firm’s tech.

    Read More: Microsoft Officially Extends Its Partnership With OpenAI

    Microsoft has been rolling out the technology behind ChatGPT to its various platforms and services at a record pace, from email creation in Viva Sales to incorporating it into Azure OpenAI service.

    The biggest way Microsoft is incorporating OpenAI’s tech is in its Bing search engine. The company previewed it earlier this week, and the reviews were largely positive. Microsoft is also including a new and improved version of OpenAI’s tech, meaning it will be faster and more accurate in the answers it provides.

    Microsoft appears to be addressing the ethics of AI use as well. Business Insider’s Huileng Tan asked the new search engine to write a cover letter for a job. The AI responded that it could not do that as it would be “unethical” and “unfair to other applicants.” Bing did, however, give her general writing tips to help her and ended by wishing her “Good luck!”

    China’s Answer: Baidu

    Not one to be left out, Baidu is working on a ChatGPT-like AI of its own, named Ernie, which the company expects to launch publicly in March. Baidu is largely seen as the best chance for China to remain competitive in the search market, especially as the industry transitions to AI-driven results.

    See Also: Baidu Set to Unveil AI-Powered Search

    Despite having a home-turf advantage, Baidu may be facing a major impediment from its own government. The company’s stock took a major hit after a state media warning about the hype surrounding AI chatbots.

    This wouldn’t be the first time China has sabotaged its own tech industry, with Beijing having a complicated history of alternately promoting and then punishing its tech industry. If that behavior continues, it could significantly undermine Baidu’s ability to compete.

    The Dark Horse: Yahoo

    Once the world’s dominant search engine, Yahoo has long since ceded the crown. These days the company outsources its search to Bing, focusing on news and other digital elements.

    In late January, however, Yahoo surprised the industry by teasing a return to the search market. The company posted a job opening for a Product Manager for Search and has been dropping cryptic tweets about its plans. The company has tweeted about how it “did search before it was cool” and that it would “BRB making it cool again.”

    After years of irrelevance in the search market, it’s hard to imagine what would suddenly make Yahoo decide to make a go of it again — unless the company planned to take advantage of a game-changing shift in technology to help it play catch-up.

    Yahoo’s biggest challenge, of course, will be execution. The company has a long history of making bad decisions when it comes to search, passing up multiple opportunities to buy Google when the company was worth a small fraction of its current value.

    The Current Leader: Google

    Of course, that begs the question: What about Google? Where is the company in its AI efforts, and can it respond to this new threat effectively?

    The truth is, no one really knows. The appearance of ChatGPT and Microsoft’s quick adoption of the underlying tech sent shockwaves through the search giant. CEO Sundar Pichai issued a “code red,” reorganized labor in an effort to come up with an answer, and founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin returned to assist.

    The company scrambled to unveil its Bard conversational AI, only to bungle the launch when Bard provided the wrong answer to one of the questions posed to it. That mistake, at least temporarily, wiped $100 billion from Alphabet’s value as investors dumped the stock in response.

    Read More: Google Bard Flubs Its Debut, Gives Wrong Answer in Company Ad

    From the outside looking in, it certainly appears that Google got caught off-guard and is scrambling to play catch-up and making mistakes it can’t afford to make.

    OpenAI’s founder, Sam Altman, seems to agree, likening Google to “a lethargic search monopoly.” He talks about what it would be like to be in Google’s shoes and “to think about a world where there was going to be a real challenge to the way that monetization of this works and new ad units, and maybe even a temporary downward pressure, I would not feel great about that.”

    What Happens Next

    Despite Google’s years-long dominance in the search market, Microsoft clearly has an advantage moving forward. The company is taking advantage of cutting-edge AI tech developed by the de facto leader in the space. What’s more, the company has invested billions to secure its ongoing, exclusive access to OpenAI’s innovations.

    In contrast, Google is clearly in a position it’s not used to being in: playing from behind. It is scrambling to catch up and making the kind of mistakes common to that scenario.

    Meanwhile, Baidu is similarly behind Microsoft and may face regulatory hurdles that cripple its ability to compete effectively.

    While Yahoo can’t be ruled out, the burden of proof is on it, as to whether it can compete any better in the AI Search War than it did in the original Search Wars.

    Ultimately, this will likely come down to a two-way battle between Microsoft and Google, the two companies that have the resources and expertise to drive this new era of AI-driven search forward.

    In addition to being first to the party, Microsoft has another major advantage over its rival: It is moving like a nimble startup, outmaneuvering Google. As we have written before, in instance after instance, Microsoft is moving forward in a decisive fashion while Google gets bogged down, acting like “a stodgy, risk-averse corporate entity.”

    Read More: How Microsoft Is Outmaneuvering Google

    Regardless of how much Google has dominated search to date, the future is wide open and may well be Microsoft’s to lose.

  • Yahoo Teasing a Search Engine Return

    Yahoo Teasing a Search Engine Return

    Yahoo is teasing a return to the search engine market years after abandoning it to Google and Microsoft.

    Yahoo was once the dominant search engine on the internet, long before Google became a household name, let alone a verb. In fact, Yahoo botched two different opportunities to buy Google, one for a mere $1 million. In the time since those — and other — bad decisions, Yahoo’s search share shrunk, the company’s other prospects dimmed, and it finally outsourced its search to Microsoft Bing. After changing hands a couple of times, the company’s prospects look to be on the rise again.

    According to a job posting and various tweets, the internet company is once again ready to take search seriously. The job posting, for a Product Manager for Search, has the following description:

    As a Product Manager for Search, you will help develop our search strategy and roadmap and lead its execution. The ideal candidate will leverage strong organizational skills and deep subject matter expertise to partner with design, science, engineering, and other key cross-functional teams. You will determine what we prioritize for our customers in our search experiences and bring the vision to life. You will also lead the effort to discover and amplify content from across the vast Yahoo ecosystem to create new and innovative search experiences across surfaces and for our Search App. The role is also responsible for identifying and documenting product and business requirements and taking them from concept to production, while working with a broad set of stakeholders that include marketing, sales, legal, editorial, design, UXR, and other teams.

    In addition to the job posting, Yahoo has also been dropping hints via its Yahoo Search Twitter account.

    The company also tweeted about a Search Engine Land article discussing this news.

    If Yahoo is truly eyeing a return to the search market, this may be the best possible time. Google is facing increasing headwinds and regulatory challenges to its dominant position, and Microsoft has never been able to mount a major challenge.

    With users and lawmakers looking for alternatives and AI-based technologies poised to upend the search industry, Yahoo may finally have an opening to do what it failed to do all those years ago — make a success of search.

  • Yahoo Names Jessica Alba to Its Board

    Yahoo Names Jessica Alba to Its Board

    Yahoo appointed six people to its board, including Jessica Alba, Hollywood actress and entrepreneur.

    Verizon sold Yahoo to Apollo Funds in September 2021, essentially putting Yahoo under its own name for the first time in years. The company has been working to rebuild its fortunes and compete in an internet landscape far different from the one it started in. As part of its attempt, the company is reworking its board in an effort to increase diversity, according to Reuters.

    At the time of the purchase, Apollo Funds made it clear it intended to help rebuild Yahoo over the long haul:

    “We look forward to partnering with Yahoo’s talented employee base to build on the company’s strong momentum and position the new Yahoo for long-term success as a standalone consumer internet and digital media leader,” said Reed Rayman, Partner at Apollo.

    As Reuters points out, since the acquisition Yahoo has been growing its Yahoo Finance and Yahoo Sports properties, as well as its advertising an e-commerce platforms.

    The company is clearly determined to regain its place as one of the preeminent internet companies, and hopefully its latest efforts will help it accomplish its goal. More competition is a good things, and Yahoo is one of the few companies that has the name brand necessary to give Google and Meta a run for their money.

  • DuckDuckGo Grew by 46% in 2021, Averaging 100 Million Daily Searches

    DuckDuckGo Grew by 46% in 2021, Averaging 100 Million Daily Searches

    DuckDuckGo is making major headway in the search market, growing by 46% in 2021 and averaging more than 100 million daily searches.

    DuckDuckGo is a privacy-focused search engine that does not track or profile its users, unlike Google or Bing. The company does rely on advertising, but those ads are based solely on the keywords and content of a specific search.

    While the company’s market share pales in comparison to Google, it is solidly in fourth place, behind Google, Bing, and Yahoo. According to Bleeping Computer, DuckDuckGo saw its searches go from 23.6 billion in 2020 to 34.6 billion in 2021. That translates to a daily average in 2021 of 100 million, up from 79 million in 2020.

    Obviously, DuckDuckGo still has a long way to go before it represents any real threat to Google, but the company continues to prove that profits don’t have to come at the expense of user privacy.

  • Yahoo the Latest US Company to Pull Out of China

    Yahoo the Latest US Company to Pull Out of China

    Yahoo is the latest US company pulling out of China, citing an “increasingly challenging business and legal environment.”

    China has been cracking down on the tech industry and making it difficult for foreign companies to compete. The country also has a long history of internet censorship. As a result, a number of high-profile companies have announced plans to leave the market, including LinkedIn and Epic.

    According to Associated Press, Yahoo has now joined their ranks and announced it will no longer offer services in mainland China beginning November 1.

    “Yahoo remains committed to the rights of our users and a free and open internet. We thank our users for their support,” the statement read.

  • From the Ashes: Yahoo Is Back!

    From the Ashes: Yahoo Is Back!

    One of the oldest internet companies is once again under its own name, as Yahoo is no longer part of Verizon.

    In May, Verizon announced it was selling Verizon Media to Apollo Funds. Verizon Media included the Yahoo and AOL brands, and was part of Verizon’s attempt to take on Google and Facebook in the advertising market.

    The acquisition is now complete, and Yahoo is once again operating as a standalone company under its own name.

    “We look forward to partnering with Yahoo’s talented employee base to build on the company’s strong momentum and position the new Yahoo for long-term success as a standalone consumer internet and digital media leader,” said Reed Rayman, Partner at Apollo. “We couldn’t be more excited about this next chapter for Yahoo as we look to invest in growth across the business, including accelerating its customer-first offerings and commerce capabilities, expanding its reach and enhancing the daily user experience.”

    “This is a new era for Yahoo,” said Guru Gowrappan, CEO, Yahoo. “The close of the deal heralds an exciting time of renewed opportunity for us as a standalone entity. We anticipate that the coming months and years will bring fresh growth and innovation for Yahoo as a business and a brand, and we look forward to creating that future with our new partners.”

    With some 900 million monthly active users, Yahoo has significant potential to be a profitable company for Apollo Funds.

  • Verizon Media Sold to Apollo Funds

    Verizon Media Sold to Apollo Funds

    Following reports Verizon was exploring a sale of Yahoo and AOL, its Verizon Media business is being sold to Apollo Funds.

    Verizon purchased Yahoo and AOL, both pioneers among the early internet companies. Although both had since fallen on hard times, the two brands still had large, loyal followings. Verizon’s goal was to build an advertising business that could rival Google and Facebook.

    Unfortunately, the advertising business proved more difficult for Verizon to crack than it planned. Over the last several years, the company has been selling off some of its media properties, with Yahoo and AOL being the final piece. Apollo Funds has agreed to purchase Verizon Media for $5 billion. The new company will be known as Yahoo, and Verizon will maintain a 10% stake in it.

    “We are excited to be joining forces with Apollo,” said Guru Gowrappan, CEO, Verizon Media. “The past two quarters of double-digit growth have demonstrated our ability to transform our media ecosystem. With Apollo’s sector expertise and strategic insight, Yahoo will be well positioned to capitalize on market opportunities, media and transaction experience and continue to grow our full stack digital advertising platform. This transition will help to accelerate our growth for the long- term success of the company.”

    “We are thrilled to help unlock the tremendous potential of Yahoo and its unparalleled collection of brands,” said Reed Rayman, Private Equity Partner at Apollo. “We have enormous respect and admiration for the great work and progress that the entire organization has made over the last several years, and we look forward to working with Guru, his talented team, and our partners at Verizon to accelerate Yahoo’s growth in its next chapter.”

    “We are big believers in the growth prospects of Yahoo and the macro tailwinds driving growth in digital media, advertising technology and consumer internet platforms,” said David Sambur, Senior Partner and Co-Head of Private Equity at Apollo. “Apollo has a long track record of investing in technology and media companies and we look forward to drawing on that experience to help Yahoo continue to thrive.”

    “Verizon Media has done an incredible job turning the business around over the past two and a half years and the growth potential is enormous,” said Hans Vestberg, CEO, Verizon. “The next iteration requires full investment and the right resources. During the strategic review process, Apollo delivered the strongest vision and strategy for the next phase of Verizon Media. I have full confidence that Yahoo will take off in its new home.”

  • Verizon May Sell Yahoo and AOL Assets

    Verizon May Sell Yahoo and AOL Assets

    Verizon is looking to sell Yahoo and AOL assets, as it pivots away from the digital media business it spent billions to enter.

    Verizon bought Yahoo and AOL for a combined $9 billion, in an effort to diversify beyond its core business. The company saw its phone subscribers as a way to drive growth to digital media properties, and ultimately challenge the likes of Facebook and Google for digital media and advertising.

    The company’s plans have been far from successful, and it is now looking to sell off its digital media assets, including both Yahoo and AOL, according to The Wall Street Journal. The decision follows a $4.5 billion write down of its digital media business in 2018, the sale of Tumblr in 2019 and the sale of HuffPost to BuzzFeed in November of last year.

    Verizon has already involved Apollo Global Management, Inc. in the deal, one that some believe could be worth as much as $5 billion. Given the challenges Verizon faces moving forward with its 5G rollout, and the vast sum of money it recently spent to acquire more spectrum, $5 billion could be far more helpful in its core business.

  • Yahoo Answers Shutting Down May 4

    Yahoo Answers Shutting Down May 4

    After 16 years, Yahoo Answers is shutting down on May 4, 2021.

    Yahoo Answers is a well-known, community-driven part of Yahoo’s online properties, featuring questions and answers across a broad range of categories and interests. Unlike competing sites, such as Quora, Yahoo Answers was often ridiculed for vague and incorrect answers.

    The site’s days are now numbered, with Yahoo announcing it would be shutting down the site on May 4. The company says other Yahoo services and properties will not be impacted.

    These changes are specific to Yahoo Answers. They won’t impact your Yahoo Account or any other Yahoo services.

    Yahoo is also making user content available for download.

    Your content must be requested before June 30, 2021. Follow the instructions for downloading your Yahoo Answers data.

    Your Yahoo Answers data download will return all user-generated content including your Questions list, Questions, Answers list, Answers, and any images. You won’t be able to download other users’ content, questions, or answers.

    While many people will not miss Yahoo Answers, it’s still a symbolic loss for a company that helped pioneer many of the internet search features users take for granted.

  • Marissa Mayer’s New Company Launches AI-Driven Contact App

    Marissa Mayer’s New Company Launches AI-Driven Contact App

    Marissa Mayer’s new company, Sunshine, has launched Sunshine Contacts, an app that organizes iOS contacts.

    Marissa Mayer previously served as CEO of Yahoo from 2012 to 2017, when Verizon acquired the company. Prior to her time at Yahoo, Mayer was a long-time Google employee and executive.

    Since leaving Yahoo, Mayer cofounded Sunshine with the goal of creating “advanced technology to make mundane tasks effortless, free up your time, and make it easier to be thoughtful.”

    The company’s Sunshine Contacts is a perfect example, using artificial intelligence (AI) to understand the relationships between people. This helps the app organize communication, events and more. The app also uses AI to pull together the various bits of a contact’s information into one location, making it easier to keep the information organized and up-to-date.

    “We’re incredibly proud to introduce Sunshine to the world today,” said Marissa Mayer, Sunshine co-founder and CEO. “The essential technologies that help us stay connected to those who matter most are antiquated. They’ve been around forever and we all see them as ‘good enough,’ despite their outsized impact on our interactions and relationships. At Sunshine, we believe there’s an immense opportunity to make the mundane magical. It’s been an extremely challenging and rewarding problem to tackle and we’re just getting started.”

    “The idea of ‘sunshine’ elicits happiness – just as our company and the products we’ll build intend to do,” said Enrique Muñoz Torres, Sunshine co-founder and President. “Our goal is to give people intuitive insights to help them strengthen their relationships, improve how they spend their time, and make it easier to stay in touch. As first-time founders, we’re excited about the team we’ve built to help accomplish this and we look forward to addressing more everyday problems.”

    The app is available via invitation for the time being. As of yet, there has been no announcement regarding general availability.

  • DuckDuckGo Experiences Major Growth

    DuckDuckGo Experiences Major Growth

    DuckDuckGo, the privacy-first search engine, is experiencing record growth as customers become more concerned about protecting their privacy.

    According to a company tweet, the search engine touted “a record breaking August,” with some two billion searches, 4 million app/extension installs and an estimated 65 million active users. The company admits it doesn’t have an exact count as a result of the very same privacy that makes the search engine unique.

    Despite DuckDuckGo’s growth, it still has a long way to go before it’s a threat to Google. The search giant currently controls 87.3%, with Bing a distant runner-up at 7.2%. Even Yahoo only has 3.41%. DuckDuckGo brings up fourth place with 1.75%.

    Even so, as customers become more privacy-conscious, DuckDuckGo may soon start moving into third and second place.

  • Apple Buys Dark Sky Weather App

    Apple Buys Dark Sky Weather App

    Apple has purchased popular weather app Dark Sky, according to Dark Sky’s blog.

    Dark Sky quickly made a name for itself as “the most accurate source of hyperlocal weather information.” The app is loved by customers for giving “down-to the-minute forecasts…right where you’re standing,” giving it a significant advantage over many other apps on the market.

    “Today we have some important and exciting news to share: Dark Sky has joined Apple,” writes Adam Grossman on the company’s blog.

    “Our goal has always been to provide the world with the best weather information possible, to help as many people as we can stay dry and safe, and to do so in a way that respects your privacy.

    “There is no better place to accomplish these goals than at Apple. We’re thrilled to have the opportunity to reach far more people, with far more impact, than we ever could alone.”

    As part of the deal, the iOS version of the app will continue to be available on the App Store, while the Android and Wear OS apps are no longer available and will shut down for existing users after July 1, 2020. Similarly, the API will continue to function through the end of 2021 but, in the meantime, the company is not accepting new signups.

    Apple will likely use the acquisition to help improve its own weather app, which was originally powered by Yahoo and then more recently by The Weather Channel. Dark Sky should give the company a competitive advantage in weather apps, and will make a nice addition to the iOS ecosystem.

  • Jason Calacanis: This Could Be Facebook’s AOL Peak, Their Yahoo Peak

    Jason Calacanis: This Could Be Facebook’s AOL Peak, Their Yahoo Peak

    Internet entrepreneur and investor Jason Calacanis suggests that Facebook may go the way of AOL and Yahoo. “This could be, it’s possible, maybe not probable but possible, this could be their AOL peak, their Yahoo peak,” said Calacanis. “I think this could be peak Facebook right now.”

    Jason Calacanis, Internet entrepreneur and angel investor in over 150 startups including Uber, Evernote, and Tumblr, discussed the current Facebook crisis on CNBC:

    This is a Pretty Serious Crisis

    This is a pretty serious crisis. If you look at the stakeholders involved, shareholders obviously no longer want to hold the stock and you’re seeing the stock collapse. If you look at employee morale it’s incredibly low. Founders who sold their company to Facebook, to Zuckerberg, and made billions of dollars have been incredibly critical of Mark Zuckerberg, which is pretty incredible when you think about it. You give somebody a couple of billion dollars and then they criticize you on the way out the door, it’s pretty unheard of.

    Advertisers Still Love the Platform

    But advertisers still love the platform. Anecdotally, the companies I work with, private companies, it is the only game in town to reach users at this level of scale. One has to wonder if the fourth constituent, which is governments around the world, are going to put up with their democracies being compromised. You put those four stakeholders together and this is a true crisis for Facebook.

    This could be, it’s possible, maybe not probable but possible, this could be their AOL peak, their Yahoo peak. Those companies peaked with hundreds of millions of users, and in AOL’s case 30 million plus paid users, and it took a decade or two for those companies to deprecate.

    People Are Realizing That This is Not a Positive for Society

    Facebook’s on a whole different scale with two and a half billion people, so I don’t think they’re going anywhere anytime soon. The advertisers still love it and the advertisers are going to always go to the platform that has the lowest customer acquisition cost. But this is a crisis amongst the executives and the people who work there and I think people are starting to realize that net-net this is not a positive for society. Put it all together and you don’t want to own the stock and you don’t want to work at the company, so that’s pretty dark when you think about it.

    This Could Be Peak Facebook Right Now

    I don’t know that there’s an easy solution other than grinding it out for the next three or four years just like they did with the mobile problem. They couldn’t figure out mobile advertising and they figured that out so maybe they’ll figure this out. But I think this could be peak Facebook right now.

  • Yahoo Reveals Its Search Secrets, Vespa Tool is Now Available as Open Source

    Yahoo Reveals Its Search Secrets, Vespa Tool is Now Available as Open Source

    Yahoo is now giving away the crucial technology powering its internal searches. Vespa, the search engine used by the tech company for internal queries, is now open-source and available to everyone.

    Oath Inc., the Verizon company that acquired Yahoo in June, announced that Vespa is now available as open source on GitHub. According to a company blog post, making the Big Data processing and serving engine open source is a step further in Oath’s commitment to opening up its infrastructure to developers.

    “By releasing Vespa, we are making it easy for anyone to build applications that can compute responses to user requests, over large datasets, at real time and at internet scale – capabilities that up until now, have been within reach of only a few large companies,” Jon Bratseth, a systems architect at Yahoo, explained via the blog post.

    Vespa powers Yahoo network’s internal search feature and is used to determine what recommendations to display as well as the company’s ad targeting system. Currently, Vespa is used in around 150 apps such as Yahoo’s main search engine, Yahoo Mail, and Flicker, CNBC reported. The search tool is also responsible for serving around 3 billion native ads daily.

    Vespa traces its roots back to AllTheWeb, a Norwegian search engine which was acquired by Yahoo in 2003, according to Wired. Since then, the tool has been modified as a general purpose engine that Yahoo could use internally in a host of different applications.

    This is not the first time Yahoo released some of its technology as open source. In 2009, the company released Hadoop as open source which became a hit when it was adopted by big tech companies such as Facebook, Twitter, and eBay. Apparently, the plan is to replicate the benefits of making Hadoop publicly available which allowed Yahoo to easily recruit programmers as it became widely used.

    But Vespa’s reach has the potential to overshadow that of Hadoop. As Bratseth puts it, “Vespa is larger in scope and lines of code than any open source project we’ve ever released,” adding that it has already been battle-proven in Yahoo’s largest and most critical systems. It is attractive both for its scalability and versatility while it is touted to be better than Hadoop in serving results to end users.

    However, there are doubts that Vespa could be successful outside of Oath. According to Wired, Hadoop became a success because it was born open source and arrived at a time when businesses needed it most. This time, however, most large companies have already addressed web search issues that Vespa is designed for. In addition, there are already other open source engines available.

    [Featured Image via Yahoo]

  • Warren Buffett Interested In Financing Yahoo Acquisition

    Warren Buffett Interested In Financing Yahoo Acquisition

    Berkshire Hathaway Chairman and CEO Warren Buffett has offered to help finance Dan Gilbert’s potential Yahoo acquisition. Buffet told CNBC , “I’m an enormous admirer of Dan and what he has accomplished in Quicken Loans‎. Yahoo is not the type of thing I’d ever be an equity partner in. I don’t know the business and wouldn’t know how to evaluate it, but if Dan needed financing, with proper terms and protections, we would be a possible financing help.”

    Buffett’s financing help may allow Gilbert to better compete with Verizon which is also bidding for Yahoo. The speculation is that Yahoo is not getting the offer amounts it was looking for.

  • Yahoo Mail Adds GIF, Google Drive, Dropbox Access

    Yahoo Mail Adds GIF, Google Drive, Dropbox Access

    Yahoo announced two updates for the Yahoo Mail app, which the company says makes “sending compelling, creative emails” easier. These include access to files from Google Drive and Dropbox and the ability to add GIFs from Tumblr into your email.

    “With these updates, you can quickly send spring break photos, that important presentation, the perfect GIF that describes your excitement, and more,” a spokesperson for Yahoo tells WebProNews.

    “We not only display the most popular GIFs of the moment, but you can also select from categories including Love, LOL, Cute, Cheers, Fail, Happy, or search for the perfect GIF. Tap on the GIF or GIFs you like and they will be added into your email,” the company adds.

    When you tap on the cloud icon in compose, you’ll be able to connect your Google Drive or Dropbox account and access your files.

    Other updates are the ability to preview large files instantly, delete drafts right away, and three Android home screen widgets.

    Earlier this week, Yahoo announced the ability to sync and match mobile contacts instantly in Yahoo Messenger so you can find and chat with friends faster. Messenger also now supports non-English languages for the first time. Support includes Chinese, French, German, Indonesian, Spanish, and more.

    Images via Yahoo

  • Yahoo Said To Be Giving Interested Parties Longer For Opening Bids

    On Thursday, a report from Bloomberg came out indicating that Verizon is poised to make a first-round bid for Yahoo and that Google parent Alphabet is considering doing the same.

    The report also said that AT&T and Comcast, and Microsoft have all decided not to bid at this time, and that Time Inc., Bain, TPG, and others are still in the cards. IAC/Interactive Corp., News Corp, and Disney have all been mentioned as potential suitors at one time or another.

    The due date for first-round bids had been reported as April 11, but Kara Swisher at Re/code is now reporting that Yahoo has moved the deadline to April 18, giving suitors another week. Swisher, who has reported much Yahoo insider info over the years, cites sources close to the situation and “blabby bankers” as her sources here. Here’s what she says about Google:

    Hey, over there, Google is sure interested. (The truth is, its M&A unit crunched the numbers as they should, but an offer is highly unlikely!)

    After the regulatory difficulty Google has had in partnering with Yahoo in the past, it’s unclear how these things would work if Google were to try and move forward with such an acquisition.

    Stay tuned.

    Image via Yahoo (Twitter)

  • Google Parent May Try to Buy Yahoo?

    Google parent Alphabet (formerly Google) is considering bidding on Yahoo as the deadline for first-round bids approaches. This is particularly interesting considering that regulators shut down a potential Google/Yahoo partnership years ago.

    Bloomberg reports that Verizon intends to make a first-round bid next week, and citing a different source, shares the Google news (which comes from a different, unnamed source).

    Citing yet another source, it says AT&T, Comcast, and Microsoft have all decided not to bid for now. The report says:

    Time Inc. is still evaluating a bid, while private equity funds Bain and TPG — among others — are also planning to make a run at the business, either alone or by backing a strategic acquirer, the people said. While the buyout firms haven’t yet paired themselves with a strategic buyer, they are open to the idea of doing so, the people said.

    IAC/Interactive Corp., News Corp, and Disney have all been mentioned as potential suitors at one time or another.

    The due date for first-round bids is April 11.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Yahoo Mail Gets Enhanced Link Previews

    Yahoo Mail Gets Enhanced Link Previews

    Yahoo Mail announced new enhanced link previews that a spokesperson for Yahoo says “transform the typical blue link into a visual, informative card that gives email recipients a snapshot of the content right in their email.”

    “With link previews, you can now play video and audio right in the email, and share the link directly to your social networks,” they said. “We’ve also improved the underlying technology to produce a richer preview with price, movie title, article author and more.”

    With the new previews, you can control the size and location to select where the preview fits best in the email (inline with text or at the bottom).

    Any link preview you receive in an email can be shared on Tumblr, Facebook, and Twitter with the share button at the top of the preview image.

    Yahoo talks about the new previews in a blog post here.

    Last week, Yahoo announced that people can now sign up for a new Yahoo Mail account using an existing email address and without having to create a new Yahoo address.

    Images via Yahoo

  • You Can Now Get A Yahoo Account With Any Email Address

    You Can Now Get A Yahoo Account With Any Email Address

    Yahoo announced that you can now sign up for a new Yahoo Mail account without having to create a new Yahoo email address. You can use your existing Gmail, Outlook, or any other non-Yahoo email address to create a new Yahoo account.

    This follows a move a year ago by Google, which finally started supporting accounts from other providers like Yahoo and Microsoft.

    With Yahoo’s update, users can use their Yahoo account for Yahoo Fantasy Sports, Finance, Sports, Messenger, etc.

    “We want to make it as delightful as possible for users to sign up, sign in, and stay signed in because this lets us deliver the best possible experience. Starting with Yahoo Fantasy Sports, like Tourney Pick’em, we’ve upped the ante with this new registration experience and will roll this into other Yahoo products soon.”

    Separately Yahoo announced some new features for Yahoo Mail on iOS including new themes and 3D gestures.