Yahoo Kills Flipboard Competitor Six Months After Debut

redletterdave writes "It seemed like a step in the right direction for Yahoo back in November, when the company announced a family of new mobile products that would enrich the way users experience and understand their news and entertainment content. But just shy of seven months after that outburst of mobile and social apps and tools, Yahoo has decided to call it quits on arguably the biggest piece of that mobile package: the personalized magazine app for iPad, Livestand. This was the first major business decision made by Ross Levinsohn, the interim CEO who took over for Scott Thompson on May 13 after the SEC discovered Thompson lied on his resume."

Comments

CEO has to mark his Territory

[Fluffeh]

This looks just like a "Hey! Imma doing something! Yay Me!" type move from Ross Levinsohn. I often find within the company that I work for, that when a project changes hands, the new Project Manager feels that he/she needs to stamp in some sort of "territory" so that they seem to be doing something. Sadly though, it also seems that many of these decisions are made without a full understanding of impacts and result in poor implementation. Given that these apps seemed to be at least getting Yahoo looking in the right direction, it seems a shame to see them canned. Given that Yahoo is in such a poor position at the moment, I don't think that a conservative approach is a good strategy for them at the moment - they need to be rolling the dice on long odds while they still have the money to be able to afford to do so. Give them a few more years of stagnation and their customers moving onto other products and they simply won't have the capital or time to find that "new big thing" that will ressurect them.

Re:CEO has to mark his Territory

[Fluffeh]

I reject the assertion that yahoo is just a bag of bones.

They are losing market share, their name once used to be "God" on the mouth of the internet. Now look at what they are. Ask a 12 year old what Yahoo is, then ask about Google. They ARE a bag of bones.

I know many people at the company, and they are some of the most creative, energetic programmers that I have met. All the new management team needs to do is unlock the potential that exists within their own staff.

You realize that this is paraphrasing exactly what I said yes? A company the size of Yahoo will no doubt have plenty of creative and skilled people, but that doesn't mean a damn if the new CEO is killing off their ideas. I am saying that the company HAS to start implementing these ideas and letting them come to fruition so that if they gamble on 10 out-there ideas right now while they still have the money to do so, it might be enough to find the next new idea that bring Yahoo back to at least some of its former glory. All the brightest, most creative geniuses in a company mean nothing if their ideas aren't followed through.

Re:CEO has to mark his Territory

[stephanruby]

I wonder if you actually tried the app.

As I recall, it is so slow as to be unusable on my iPad (original model) and crashes frequently.

It deserves to die.

The Android Yahoo app is also slow on my Samsung Galaxy tab 10.1, mostly because of the new heavy banner advertisement they force you to load before each and every story. And there is really no reason for anyone to use it, when there are so many free alternatives that have smaller and less intrusive ads and that are getting far better ratings overall in the Android Market/Google Play Store.

They don't need to kill their apps. They just need to kill their current mobile advertising network, and purchase an existing one (or copy the features of an existing one) that doesn't try to kill the user experience trying to squeeze out every single penny out of our eye balls (and cell phone batteries).

Re:CEO has to mark his Territory

[qxcv]

Their iOS app.

That's right, because the only way a web service can be successful is if it has a thin wrapper over its API in the form of an iOS app so poor users don't have to open Safari.
 
Also, I don't think you should be measuring other companies against Instagram. There's no greater proof that we are in the middle of a second tech bubble than the fact that a company whith no discernible monetisation strategy managed to be bought for $1 billion.

Re:CEO has to mark his Territory

[hairyfeet]

Because for normal folks (the non geeks out there) the Yahoo Portal has replaced the morning paper and the last figures i saw had yahoo mail as #1 in number of active users?

Frankly Yahoo has a BUNCH of original content....that nobody knows about. Did you know that have over 70 categories on their portal, from comedy and horoscopes to fantasy football? I didn't, not until I hooked up with my current GF who uses the Yahoo portal as her home page and decided to check it out. Hell I've been using Yahoo mail as a primary email for years, I like to explore, how did I not notice this? Its because they don't advertise these services, even on their own portal, instead they are on this little strip on the far left side of the page that doesn't draw the eye at all.

So lets see if this CEO knows what to do with all this content. if it were me I'd be featuring a couple of different categories each week front and center on the portal, change the placement and size of the category pane to make it more eye catching and maybe have a couple of little humorous "tutorial" videos pointing out all this free stuff. Because frankly they have plenty of content they just need to let folks know it exists.

Too bad, it was a good app

[yog]

I like Livestand. It's a richer interface than the one-dimensional approach of the classic browser news portal. I wonder if it was costing them too much money to maintain, or not enough ad revenue, or no revenue at all. That part was never clear to me; paging through the app, I don't see much in the way of ads.

I wonder what's happening to Yahoo these days; they seem not to have a clue since about 2003 or so. They were a great portal back in the '90s and I still have them bookmarked for news and weather, and my wife uses their email. They have so much potential; something isn't adding up.

Re:how long will it take

[greg1104]

At its peak in late 1999, Yahoo's market cap was over $100B. You don't just kill a hundred billion dollar company all at once; they have been doing a solid job of strangling it slowly for the last twelve years though. Shouldn't be too much longer.

Another cool yahoo project

[brillow]

Another cool-looking yahoo project that I never heard about until they decided to cancel it. If only yahoo spent as much energy talking about the things they are starting as much as the things they are ending.

Re:Another cool yahoo project

[AmberBlackCat]

I hope nobody tells the CEO that Yahoo Groups is still functioning.

Re:Yahoo should do everyone a favor

[PopeRatzo]

Haven't used YooHoo in years.

Be careful friend. You are inadvertently smearing one of the finest beverages on God's Earth.

6 ounces of YooHoo, a jigger of Slivovitza, 1 oz of the juice of one boiled Ayahuasca vine and a cocktail onion over cracked (not crushed) ice is a great summer refresher. Miniature japanese umbrellas decorate the top of the glass to create a festive atmosphere for a party you'll never forget.

Re:how long will it take

[guttentag]

At its peak in late 1999, Yahoo's market cap was over $100B. You don't just kill a hundred billion dollar company all at once; they have been doing a solid job of strangling it slowly for the last twelve years though. Shouldn't be too much longer.

For a moment there I thought you were talking about Facebook.

Re:Yahoo should do everyone a favor

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

I think that's part of a Steely Dan song:

"The YooHoo drink. The fine European Nutella...make tonight a wonderful thing.

Sing it again.

The YooHoo drink. The fine European Nutella...make tonight a wonderful thing."

Re:Yahoo should do everyone a favor

[PopeRatzo]

Do you attain shaman status afterwards?

Brother, shamans try to attain PopeRatzo status.