The constant changes in the field of communications have led Yahoo to pull the plug on one of the earliest instant messaging services. Yahoo! Messenger will be officially shut down from July 17, 2018.
The online service of Yahoo! Messenger.introduced instant messaging in this century. The company primarily wishes to experiment and construct new mediums of conversation, which fits the generation’s needs. As a substitute, users can enjoy the features Yahoo! Messenger still provides a service called Squirrel, an invite-only group messaging application.
For those who are unaware, Yahoo! Messenger was originally launched in 1998 under the name Yahoo Pager. It was one of the first services through which files and messages could be sent instantly at free of the cost. The service laid the foundation to popularize the world ‘chatting’. Profile pictures and emojis were an alien concept back then, but Yahoo had customized avatar based profile pictures and stickers, all ahead of its time.
It was the first time that geographical boundaries were brought down and the concept of ‘chat rooms’ was introduced through Yahoo Messenger. It was one of the first apps to feature BUZZing and Music-status. No wonder people are calling this an end of a cyber era! Surprisingly, the app was quite popular among oil and commodity traders in the late 90s because it was easy to use, convenient, and the most important, free of cost.
This was inevitable. Under the domination of other services like WhatAapp (fun fact: WhatsApp was created by two ex-Yahoo employees), WeChat, Snapchat, and numerous other platforms, the survival of Yahoo! Messenger was impossible. Yahoo’s service had a large user base of 122.6 million in 2009, but the introduction of smartphone apps like Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp pushed veteran chatting mediums out of the race.
The service now joins many other discontinued social media services like Orkut and AOL Instant Messenger. It has been advised, that once you download your chat history, the app should be uninstalled. Let’s hope that an exciting new form of communication is introduced by Yahoo!