I really do not remember when I first started surfing net. But frankly, initially I avoided this site as I considered it as one more Spam spreading site just because of the name Yahoo! Once I received a mail from a man of repute and then changed my mind and decided to explore. Next day I customized My Yahoo! And now all my surfing activities start from this portal. My important documents are in Yahoo! Brief case, my photos are stored in Yahoo! Photos.
As of today, Yahoo.com is the most popular Internet site in the world. It’s a portal that offers almost all services possible by a portal. More than 237 million users worldwide used the Yahoo’s global network as of December 2001. Traffic on the Yahoo’s global network increased to an average of 1.62 billion page views per day as of December 2001. A page view is defined as one electronic page of information displayed in response to a user request.
Recently I read a review on Yahoo and started browsing Yahoo with a different intension - wanted to know the history of the site and how they have grown so fast. Let me share with you.
I was pretty sure of one thing - some talented and innovative young fellow with a vision developed this site. And I am right. Yahoo started in 1994 by two students of Engineering Department of Stanford University. These students were David Filo and Jerry Yang. Started their site in a campus trailer as a way to keep track of their personal interests on the Internet. The site started as ’’Jerry’s Guide to the World Wide Web’’. Jerry’s guide was mainly a campus-affair to preview web segregated in different categories. Continual Improvement is there motto since beginning and the site grown out of proportion and they continued to change for good. Ultimately Jerry’s guide got a new name - Yahoo! It is a well-researched name.
The name Yahoo is an abbreviation for ’’Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle’’. However, according to Filo and Yang the name is selected because of the general definition of a Yahoo! - ’’Rude, Unsophisticated, Uncouth.’’
Hundreds of people started browsing this Web Guide Yahoo! and the site celebrated its first million-hit in the fall of 1994, very first year of Jerry and David on World Wide Web. Encouraged by huge support well beyond the Stanford trailer, the duo approached Silicon Valley venture capitalists. Sequoia Capital agreed to fund Yahoo in April 1995 with an initial investment of nearly $2 million and second round of funding was by Reuters Ltd. and Soft bank.
The company’s global Web network includes 25 World properties. Its headquarter is in Sunnyvale, Calif. Yahoo! has offices in Europe, Asia, Latin America, Australia, Canada and the United States. Yahoo! has acquired Twenty Companies since its inception and latest one is HotJobs. Yahoo! Is available in 12 languages including English.
Their boardroom is occupied by some world famous personalities from business communities.
Features of https://yahoo.com - Most of you know about these features. But review will remain incomplete without writing about the features.
My Yahoo! - The My Yahoo page is a web page that you can customize to suit your requirements. You may customize to display your Address book, Bookmarks, photos, Briefcase, News, Horoscope etc. You can even select the colour combination of the page.
Yahoo! Bookmarks- It is unique. Yahoo bookmarks are available anywhere as soon as you log on to My Yahoo!. Yahoo Companion, Yahoo Messenger give you one click access to view existing bookmarks and to add new bookmarks or delete an existing one.
Briefcase- 30MB of web space reserved for you in Yahoo! According to me 30 MB is enough for person like me. You can access your files whenever you log on to Internet any where in the world. This is a great facility for the guys who travel a lot. You may access it from My Yahoo! Or Companion.
Photo-album- I have stored my photos here and I can share these with anyone. This is not as comprehensive image sharing tool as WebShots. WebShot is still better but you get a added facility in one portal. You may access it from My Yahoo! Or Yahoo! Companion.
Yahoo! Messenger- Yahoo messenger has overtaken all competitors and seems to be the best messenger as of today. You have the choice to include even bookmark in Yahoo! Messenger. You are also linked to Yahoo! Address book, Weather, Stock, Email alert etc.
E-mail- My most favourite because this is one of the most functional Email services. This has features like spam blocking, filters, integration with the powerful Yahoo address book, spell check, fonts and colour. You may access it from My Yahoo! Or Companion. Best part of this mail service is Norton AntiVirus Check to all incoming and out going mails and attachments. Address Book is great to keep track of friends’ names, address, phone numbers, and email addresses.
Yahoo Companion - A very useful feature/application from Yahoo!. The Yahoo Companion is a browser bar which gives full access to Yahoo applications from IE. You can choose applications that need to be visible in the browser bar. This is really very helpful like one-click access to My Yahoo!, Bookmarks, Geocities, Mail, Briefcase, Photos, Search etc. Configuration of browser bar is saved and maintained by Yahoo. So, one can use it from anywhere if required software is loaded in the computer.
Search Engine- A useful feature however I still prefer to use Copernic. Corrected after reading Dhaval’s comment.
Calendar- I do not use this feature because my Digital Diary is good enough to take care of my appointments.
Geocities – This is best to launch web page especially for beginners.
Greetings- An enormous free E-card site of Yahoo! You can find E-greetings for for almost all occasions like birthday, love, anniversary, get-well etc with lot of choice. You get free service and greetings are delivered only when you want to be delivered.
Shopping / Clubs / Etc - No personal experience. You have to explore.
There must be many more features that I do not know. You may explore such features / services whenever you need it.
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Yahoo! - My One Stop Solution to Internet. Applications like E-mail, Bookmarks, Messenger, Companion, Address Book and feature like people search, maps, news, sports, weather, stock reports, career information makes it my one stop solution for Internet.
You have missed a lot if you are not attached to Yahoo!