Lauren Cannon

Yahoo Sheds Several Programs, Including Del.icio.us

Yahoo has given several of its longstanding services the ax. What can you do to salvage your content?

 

A slide from the Yahoo all hands meeting was leaked on Twitter yesterday.  The slide indicates that Yahoo has plans to shut down or sell a group of longstanding applications such as Yahoo Buzz, MyBlogLog, and AltaVista. However, it's Del.icio.us that's causing the largest outcry.  Some online petitions to save it from being discarded in its entirety have been started. Jeffrey Zeldman of Happy Cog, has made an official offer for his company to take over the service.

The bookmarking service was acquired in 2005 by Yahoo! and has become the premier bookmarking site in the era of social media content exchange. San Francisco-based organic technology consultant Adria Richards has over 2,400 bookmarks on Del.icio.us and uses the service to share links with her clients through their group feature. "As far as other bookmark managing services, there's nothing out there really as comparable to Delicious," she says, citing the private versus public bookmarks, tagging, and organization features.

Based on the new changes, here are ways to refresh your stored data and to keep your website current with the latest sharing buttons.

Del.icio.us - Go to "Manage" and "Organize Your Bookmarks" within the program. You will then receive an HTML file that allows you to export your information into either your Chrome or Firefox browser.

Your website or blog - Make sure that your sharing options are up-to-date. Remove the Del.icio.us and Yahoo Buzz sharing buttons, replacing them with similar applications from different providers. For Del.icio.us, Posterous, StumbleUpon, and Digg are options. In lieu of Yahoo Buzz, Google Buzz and Twitter satisfy status messaging updates.

As far as the other Yahoo programs that received the ax, Richards doesn't think they were suitable to facilitating the necessary online functions of the modern business. "Yahoo products are really underpowered for businesses," she says.