Posts filed under 'Yahoo!'
Yahoo! today announced that Google has terminated the advertising services agreement the companies announced in June. Yahoo! continues to believe in the benefits of the agreement and is disappointed that Google has elected to withdraw from the agreement rather than defend it in court. Google notified Yahoo! of its refusal to move forward with implementation of the agreement following indication from the Department of Justice that it would seek to block it, despite Yahoo!’s proposed revisions to address the DOJ’s concerns.
While the implementation of the services agreement with Google would have enabled Yahoo! to accelerate its investments in its top business priorities through an infusion of additional operating cash flow, this deal was incremental to Yahoo!’s product roadmap and does not change Yahoo!’s commitment to innovation and growth in search. The fundamental building blocks of a stronger Yahoo! in both sponsored and algorithmic search were put in place independent of the agreement.
Yahoo! continually optimizes its algorithmic and sponsored search, and we have, in 2008 alone, developed and launched hundreds of improvements all designed to enhance search quality and deliver a more relevant search experience to the company’s users. To that end, Yahoo! has benefited from strong revenue per search (RPS) gains in the U.S. as discussed on the Q3 earnings call. Furthermore, Yahoo! continues to make substantial progress against its Open Strategy and in the deployment of its game changing APT from Yahoo! display advertising platform.
Going forward, Yahoo! plans to continue to provide the cutting-edge advances in products, platforms and services that the industry needs and expects, and intends to be the destination of choice for advertisers and publishers who want to reach one of the largest and most engaged populations of consumers on the web.
November 7th, 2008
Yahoo! today announced the availability of an all-new Yahoo! Calendar, the No. 1 Web-based calendar service in the world. The new Yahoo! Calendar, which will begin rolling out in beta to users today, offers an intuitive, online social calendaring experience that enables people to be more productive.
Based on open standards, the new Yahoo! Calendar beta makes it easy for users to discover, share and keep track of events and appointments. Yahoo! Calendar is a popular feature within Yahoo! Mail, a key starting point for consumers on the Web and one of the most popular Web mail services in the world with more than 278 million users per month.
Leveraging last year’s acquisition of Zimbra, a leader in open source messaging and collaboration software that brought Ajax functionality to online calendars, the new Yahoo! Calendar is built on the Zimbra platform using the iCalendar (iCal) and CalDAV standards. The new calendar is interoperable with other online calendar services including those from Mozilla, Apple, Microsoft, AOL and Google, so users can share their calendar data with friends who use other online calendaring services and subscribe to any iCal-based public calendar.
Other new easy-to-use features allow consumers to keep track of activities through color-coding, drag and drop appointments for easy scheduling, and “zoom-in and -out” from a monthly “wall calendar” view to a single event — all from within a Yahoo! Mail account. In addition, images from the Flickr photo community can be included to create a visual, unique-looking online calendar with interesting photos.
“With the new Yahoo! Calendar, we’ve taken the concept of a traditional paper calendar and transformed it into a smart, yet simple online tool that helps people to keep track of their schedules, stay organized and be more productive,” said John Kremer, vice president, Yahoo! Mail.
“We’re executing against our vision of a smarter inbox, and this is just a preview of what’s to come in terms of integrating other network properties into the Yahoo! Mail experience. In the coming months, users will see additional features in Yahoo! Calendar to help them discover and keep track of their favorite events — like sports team schedules and concert dates — and even more features to enhance their overall communications experience.”
Key features in the new Yahoo! Calendar include:
– Sharing — Layering functionality that makes sharing events and keeping track of group activities easier
– Zoom — Calendar zoom capabilities make it easy to add and view new Calendar entries
– Photos — Integration with Flickr adds an interesting visual component to the Calendar and gives it the feel of a classic wall calendar through interesting public, Creative Commons designated photos on Flickr
– Alerts — Reminder feature makes it simple to set email, IM or SMS reminders for important Calendar activities
– Drag and Drop — Web 2.0 drag and drop functionality makes it simple to move appointments to new times — all without refreshing the Web page
– “To Do” List — A simple and handy “To List” feature makes it easy to keep track of important chores and tasks
When the Yahoo! Calendar beta becomes generally available in the coming months, it will include additional synching features and the capability to discover events of interest through tight integration with Upcoming.org and other Yahoo! properties. The Yahoo! Calendar beta is currently being rolled out in five markets: the United States, Brazil, India, Taiwan and the United Kingdom. Plans for global general availability will be announced later this year.
Openness is a major aspect of Yahoo!’s overall strategy, and open standards like CalDAV and iCalendar are key components. Yahoo! is a member of CalConnect, the Calendaring and Scheduling Consortium that helps further the development and adoption of these standards, and is hosting the CalConnect XIII members’ meetings at Yahoo!’s offices October 6th-10th.
October 8th, 2008
Yahoo! today announced the general availability of Fire Eagle (http://fireeagle.yahoo.net), an open platform that helps users take their location to the Web while giving them the ability to easily control how and where their location data is shared.
Fire Eagle gives users a place to store and manage information about their location, and offers developers clear protocols for updating or accessing that information. Because it’s open, any networked service can use Fire Eagle to respond to a user’s location – to help them find their friends, annotate the world or find nearby services or local information.
“Fire Eagle is about making everything on the Internet more useful, fun or interesting by adding the element of location,” said Tom Coates, head of product at Yahoo! Brickhouse. “We’re here to help people take their location to the Web by giving them the ability to control how much detail about their location they want to share and which applications they want to share it with.”
Fire Eagle makes it much easier for both users and developers to create Internet experiences that are geo-aware:
– For users, Fire Eagle acts as a simple interface for managing location information and deciding how — and with whom — to share it. Users can authorize Web, mobile or desktop applications to update their location automatically, or they can do it themselves manually on the Fire Eagle Web or mobile sites. Then they can decide how much of that information to share with their favorite services. At any time they can hide themselves, change their sharing preferences or delete any of their stored information.
– For developers, Fire Eagle takes away much of the costly and complicated heavy-lifting of developing geo-aware applications. Developers can focus on how they can use location in their services without having to build the infrastructure to work out where their users are. Fire Eagle — combined with Yahoo!’s full suite of geo technologies — now makes it practical for any service to become location-aware easily and inexpensively.
Fire Eagle was built at Yahoo! Brickhouse, a home for start-up like projects inside Yahoo where small teams seize on new ideas and create products around them. Since its private beta launch in March of this year, Fire Eagle has been integrated into over fifty live applications, including Dopplr, Pownce, Movable Type, and Outside.in, through the platform’s well-received API.
“The combination of Outside.in’s new Radar feature and Fire Eagle’s amazingly simple and powerful API means that our users can now see all the news and buzz within 1,000 feet of their current location, updated from any number of applications and devices,” said Steven Johnson, co-founder of Outside.in.
“Fire Eagle allowed us to easily add location data to Pownce using their simple API,” Leah Culver, co-founder, Pownce. “Pownce users can now say where they are and geotag their notes which adds a new dimension to the service.”
Services built on Fire Eagle during the private beta period include:
– Brightkite: Brightkite is a location based social network that allows users to track their friends’ locations and meet new people in their area.
– Dash: Dash is a two-way, Internet-connected GPS navigation system offering an innovative solution to traffic monitoring.
– Dipity: Dipity is the easiest way to make and share interactive stories for the people and topics users care about.
– Dopplr: Dopplr is a service for intelligent travelers that helps them make the most of their trips by sharing their travel plans with the people they trust.
– ekit: ekit is the leading communications provider to international travelers, offering a range of services including mobile phones, satellite phones, SIM cards, global calling cards, and recently the ekit travel journal.
– Lightpole: Lightpole is a mobile application service provider that distributes location-specific information to mobile devices in real-time and engages mobile users in interactive communities.
– Movable Type: Movable Type is a fully integrated, scalable, proven social publishing platform for building highly interactive websites, blogs and social networks.
– Navizon: Navizon provides a software-only wireless positioning system that triangulates signals broadcasted from Wi-Fi access points and cellular towers to help users find their location.
– Outside.in Radar: Outside.in’s Radar is personalized local news with you at the center of the map. Radar shows you everything going on nearby, wherever you are, from the stories on your street, to the events in your neighborhood, to headlines in your city.
– Pownce: Pownce is a way to keep in touch with and share messages, files, links and events with your friends.
– Loki: Loki adds your location into your favorite social networks so you can share it with your friends. Loki, powered by Skyhook Wireless, automatically informs your friend of your whereabouts, using platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Fire Eagle, RSS Feeds and more.
– SPOT: SPOT, the world’s first satellite messenger, sends users’ GPS location and custom messages to family and friends or emergency responders over a satellite communications network from virtually anywhere around the globe – even the most remote places – independent of cell phone coverage.
– ZKOUT: ZKOUT enables mobile device users to create content — messages, photos, videos — on the ZKOUT network from any location, and share it instantly with the people near you.
Developers wishing to learn more about Fire Eagle can visit: http://fireeagle.yahoo.net/developer.
August 19th, 2008
Zimbra, a Yahoo! company a leader in open source, next-generation messaging and collaboration software, today announced the release of Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop Beta. Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop gives everyone access to a simple, centralized place to manage work, school and personal e-mail even when they are not connected to the Internet. Through internet protocol support called Post Office Protocol (POP) and Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP), Yahoo! Mail, AOL Mail and Gmail can now be accessed offline at the same time, from the same place. Additionally, Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop allows users to use the iCal standard to take their calendar offline.
“Zimbra is focused on creating communication and collaboration solutions that ease the pain points of traditional e-mail, and switching between multiple e-mail accounts is one of the communication headaches that users encounter on a daily basis,” said Satish Dharmaraj, Zimbra co-founder and Yahoo! vice president. “With Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop, we have taken our world-class collaboration suite and made it available for everyone for use anywhere, anytime, with any email account.”
Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop gives users access to the same sleek Zimbra experience, and showcases the latest technologies that have until now only been available via Web-based applications including:
– “Mash-ups” with other services; for example, when viewing an e-mail, users can see their schedule by hovering over a date, or see the status of a flight by looking at a flight number;
– Powerful search that can quickly scan a user’s e-mail and pull up relevant content;
– Built-in organization capabilities including automatically converting e-mails into conversations and advanced tagging; and
– Advanced calendaring that gives users access to their most important appointments and schedule even when they are on the go.
Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop also includes a number of features designed to help users stay organized, such as document creation, spreadsheets, task management and document storage, giving users a robust alternative to other desktop applications. New features include online and offline access to:
– Zimbra Documents, a document and spreadsheet program, which gives users the ability to embed complex objects such as photos into documents and spreadsheets. With the addition of Zimbra Documents, Zimbra Desktop users can easily create and edit documents and simple spreadsheets without having to switch between desktop programs or e-mail large attachments.
– Zimbra Briefcase, which allows users to upload, store, and conveniently access any files including spreadsheets, documents, presentations and others. Instead of keeping all attachments in e-mail you can simply store them in the same place with Zimbra Briefcase, and access them from anywhere, online or offline.
– Zimbra Tasks, a task management system which allows users to manage to-do lists simply and easily by monitoring start and due dates, priority, progress and percent complete.
Pricing and Availability
Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop Beta Version 3 is available for free download at Zimbra.com/desktop. Anyone with access to Zimbra Collaboration Suite (ZCS), Yahoo! Mail, Gmail, AOL Mail, or an IMAP/POP enabled server can use Zimbra Desktop (www.zimbra.com/desktop ).
Zimbra’s Web client and server, the Zimbra Collaboration Suite 5.0 Open Source Edition is free. The commercially supported ZCS 5.0 Network Edition is available for a 60-day free trial on the Zimbra website. Zimbra’s Hosted Demo (www.zimbra.com/demo) is available for an immediate test drive of ZCS.
ZCS Network Edition includes product support as well as software subscriptions to new releases, updates and patches. ZCS is available on-premise or as a hosted service and is available at a significant educational or non-profit discount. Please contact sales@zimbra.com for information. Users can discuss topics related to the Zimbra Collaboration Suite and provide feedback at www.zimbra.com/forums.
July 30th, 2008
Yahoo! announced today that it has reached an agreement with Carl Icahn to settle their pending proxy contest related to the Company’s 2008 annual meeting of stockholders.
Under the terms of the settlement agreement, eight members of Yahoo!’s current Board of Directors will stand for re-election at the 2008 annual meeting: Roy Bostock, Ronald Burkle, Eric Hippeau, Vyomesh Joshi, Arthur Kern, Mary Agnes Wilderotter, Gary Wilson and Jerry Yang. In view of the settlement agreement with Mr. Icahn, and the termination of the proxy contest, Robert Kotick has decided not to stand for re-election to the Board at the 2008 annual meeting.Following the 2008 annual meeting, the Yahoo! Board will be expanded to 11 members. Carl Icahn will be appointed to the Board and the remaining two seats will be filled by the Board upon the recommendation of the Board’s Nominating and Governance Committee from a list of nine candidates recommended by Mr. Icahn, which includes the eight remaining members of the Icahn slate of nominees and Jonathan Miller, currently a partner in Velocity Interactive Group and former Chairman and CEO of AOL.
As part of the settlement agreement, Mr. Icahn, who owns an aggregate of 68,786,320 shares, or 4.98% of Yahoo! common stock, has agreed to withdraw his nominees for consideration at the annual meeting and to vote his Yahoo! shares in support of the Board’s nominees.
“We are gratified to have reached this agreement, which serves the best interests of all Yahoo! stockholders,” said Yahoo! Chairman Roy Bostock. “We look forward to working productively with Carl and the new members of the Board on continuing to improve the Company’s performance and enhancing stockholder value. Yahoo! is a world-class company with an extremely bright future, and collaborating together, I believe we can help the Company achieve its ambitious goals.”
“This agreement will not only allow Yahoo! to put the distraction of the proxy contest behind us, it will allow the Company to continue pursuing its strategy of being the starting point for Internet users and a must buy for advertisers,” said Yahoo! Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Jerry Yang. “No other company in the Internet space has our unique combination of global brand, talented employees, innovative technologies and exceptional assets, attributes that will help us take advantage of the large and growing opportunity ahead of us. I look forward to working together with our new colleagues on the Board to make that happen.”
Mr. Icahn said, “I am very pleased that this settlement will allow me to work in partnership with Yahoo!’s Board and management team to help the Company achieve its full potential. While I continue to believe that the sale of the whole Company or the sale of its Search business in the right transaction must be given full consideration, I share the view that Yahoo!’s valuable collection of assets positions it well to continue expanding its online leadership and enhancing returns to stockholders. I believe this is a good outcome and that we will have a strong working relationship going forward. Additionally, I am happy that the board has agreed in the settlement agreement that any meaningful transaction, including the strategy in dealing with that transaction, will be fully discussed with the entire board before any final decision is made.”
In response to Mr. Kotick’s decision to step down from the Board, Mr. Bostock said, “I would like to personally thank Bobby for his dedicated service to Yahoo! these past 5 years. Bobby has been a valuable resource to our Board and the Company and we are grateful for his contributions. He wanted to help see the Company through this recent chapter, but made it clear to me that once the proxy contest was resolved, he was eager to focus his efforts on his work as CEO of the newly merged Activision Blizzard and his other business and civic pursuits.”
The Company intends to file the full text of the settlement agreement later today with the Securities and Exchange Commission, and will also file and mail to its stockholders, supplemental proxy material.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release (including without limitation the statements and information in the quotations in this press release) contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties concerning Yahoo!’s strategic and operational plans. Actual results may differ materially from those described in this release due to a number of risks and uncertainties. The potential risks and uncertainties include, among others, the expected benefits of the commercial agreement with Google may not be realized, including as a result of actions taken by United States or foreign regulatory authorities and the response or acceptance of the agreement by publishers, advertisers, users and employees; the implementation and results of Yahoo!’s ongoing strategic initiatives; the impact of organizational changes; Yahoo!’s ability to compete with new or existing competitors; reduction in spending by, or loss of, marketing services customers; the demand by customers for Yahoo!’s premium services; acceptance by users of new products and services; risks related to joint ventures and the integration of acquisitions; risks related to Yahoo!’s international operations; failure to manage growth and diversification; adverse results in litigation, including intellectual property infringement claims; Yahoo!’s ability to protect its intellectual property and the value of its brands; dependence on key personnel; dependence on third parties for technology, services, content and distribution; general economic conditions and changes in economic conditions; potential continuing uncertainty arising in connection with Microsoft’s various proposals to acquire all or part of Yahoo!; the possibility that Microsoft or another person may in the future make other proposals, or take other actions which may create uncertainty for our employees, publishers, advertisers and other business partners; and the possibility of significant costs of defense, indemnification and liability resulting from stockholder litigation relating to such proposals. More information about potential factors that could affect Yahoo!’s business and financial results is included under the captions “Risk Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” in Yahoo!’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2007, as amended, and the Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2008, which are on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) and available at the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov. All information in this release is as of July 21, 2008, unless otherwise noted, and Yahoo! does not intend, and undertakes no duty, to update or otherwise revise the information contained in this letter.
July 23rd, 2008
Yahoo! confirmed today that it has rejected a joint proposal from Microsoft Corporation and Carl Icahn for a complex restructuring of Yahoo! that would include the acquisition of Yahoo!’s search business by Microsoft.
The proposal was made on Friday evening and Yahoo! was given less than 24 hours to accept the proposal, the fundamental terms of which Microsoft and Mr. Icahn made clear they were unwilling to negotiate. After reviewing the proposal with its legal and financial advisers, Yahoo!’s Board of Directors determined that accepting the proposal is not in the best interests of its stockholders.
The Board’s rejection of the proposal was based on a number of factors, including the following:
1. Yahoo!’s existing business plus its recently signed commercial agreement with Google has superior financial value and less complexity and risk than the Microsoft/Icahn proposal.
2. The Microsoft/Icahn proposal would preclude a potential sale of all of Yahoo! for a full and fair price, including a control premium.
3. The major component of the overall value per share asserted by Microsoft/Icahn would be in Yahoo!’s remaining non-search businesses which would be overseen by Mr. Icahn’s slate of directors, which has virtually no working knowledge of Yahoo!’s businesses.
4. The Microsoft/Icahn proposal would require the immediate replacement of the current Board and removal of the top management team at Yahoo!. The Yahoo! Board believes these moves would destabilize Yahoo! for the up to the one year it would take to gain regulatory approval for this deal.
Roy Bostock, Chairman of Yahoo! said, “This odd and opportunistic alliance of Microsoft and Carl Icahn has anything but the interests of Yahoo!’s stockholders in mind. Clearly, Microsoft, having failed to advance in search, is aligning with the short-term objectives of Mr. Icahn to coerce Yahoo! into selling its core strategic search assets on terms that are highly advantageous to Microsoft, but disadvantageous to Yahoo! stockholders. Yahoo’s Board of Directors will not allow that to happen. Yahoo!’s Board remains open to any transaction that delivers full value to our stockholders – we just do not believe such a transaction should be dictated by Microsoft and a single short-term investor.”
Mr. Bostock continued, “After negotiating among themselves without the involvement of Yahoo!, Carl Icahn and Microsoft presented us with a ‘take it or leave it’ proposal under which we would be required to restructure the Company, hand over to Microsoft Yahoo!’s valuable search business and to Carl Icahn the rest of the Company, giving us less than 24 hours to respond. It is ludicrous to think that our Board could accept such a proposal. While this type of erratic and unpredictable behavior is consistent with what we have come to expect from Microsoft, we will not be bludgeoned into a transaction that is not in the best interests of our stockholders.”
Mr. Bostock also noted that Microsoft’s position that it would not deal with, or otherwise engage with, Yahoo!’s management to reach agreement on this proposal or to implement it, is completely absurd and irresponsible given the complexity of the deal – one that requires the removal of half of Yahoo!’s business from Yahoo! and then the integration of it into Microsoft.
Yahoo!’s Board points out that a transaction to acquire the whole company would be much more straightforward and involve far less risk than the new proposal or any similar alternative. The Board believes a whole company transaction could be negotiated and executed prior to August 1st. In rejecting the Microsoft/Icahn proposal, Yahoo! not only repeated its offer to sell the entire Company to Microsoft for at least $33 per share, but also offered to negotiate an improved search only transaction. Microsoft rejected both offers.
Ironically, Carl Icahn, who jointly with Microsoft developed and presented this proposal, had previously urged Yahoo! not to sell its search business to Microsoft. Specifically, in an interview on CNBC’s Fast Money program, on June 4, 2008, Mr. Icahn said, “… it’s crazy for this company now to do this alternative deal and give the store away, because obviously, an alternative deal is a poison pill because once you’ve done an alternative deal and given the search to Microsoft, you don’t need Microsoft to buy you anymore. So, that would be a poison pill….”
Significantly, the Board believes Microsoft and Mr. Icahn are overstating the value their search and restructuring proposal would deliver to Yahoo! stockholders and are substantially understating the risks. Yahoo! noted that a transaction that would separate the Company’s search and display businesses is an undertaking of great complexity. While the Board acknowledges that the current proposal contains a number of improvements over Microsoft’s earlier proposal, the Yahoo! Board’s conclusion that the current proposal is not in the best interests of stockholders is based on a number of factors, including:
– The revenue guarantees suggested, which are conditional and subject to reduction, are well below the search revenue that the Company is expected to generate on its own and in association with its announced commercial agreement with Google. That agreement alone is estimated to generate $250 to $450 million of incremental cash flow for the first twelve months following implementation, while allowing Yahoo! to remain a principal in paid search;
– The success of the remaining Company is critically dependent on Microsoft’s ability to effectively monetize search;
– Microsoft/Icahn’s proposed Traffic Acquisition Costs rates are below market;
– The proposal calls for Yahoo! to sell its industry-leading algorithmic search business and its related strategic and valuable intellectual property portfolio for no incremental consideration; and
– Many of the components of the headline value that Mr. Icahn and Microsoft put forward, such as the spin-off of the Yahoo!’s Asian assets and the return of cash to stockholders, are steps that could be taken by Yahoo! on its own and the Board continues to evaluate these options.
Mr. Bostock concluded, “Microsoft and Mr. Icahn are trying to dismantle the Company and deliver our search business to Microsoft on terms that would be disadvantageous to Yahoo! stockholders. We are prepared to let our stockholders, not Microsoft and Carl Icahn, decide what is in their best interests and we look forward to the upcoming vote.”
July 14th, 2008
Yahoo! today announced that Yahoo! Games will offer ad-supported downloadable games from the top casual games publishers. With more than 400 ad-supported games available to users by the end of the year, Yahoo! Games solidifies its commitment to providing the Internet’s best gaming experience, and is creating new opportunities for advertisers to reach an engaged audience. The announcement brings the industry’s largest collection of ad-supported games to the biggest gaming audience on the web and reinforces Yahoo! Games’ overall strategy to be the most comprehensive distribution point for games online.
In-game advertising allows Yahoo! Games and its publisher partners to better monetize its games offering, provide advertisers access to a coveted demographic of gamers and satisfy user demand for casual ad-supported games. Top technology providers, Double Fusion and NeoEdge, will sell and integrate pre-roll, mid-roll and post-roll video ads into the Yahoo! Games catalog. Paid downloads without advertising will also be available to users on Yahoo! Games.
“In game advertising is a win-win for Yahoo! Games, our partners and our users,” said Kyle Laughlin, head of games, Yahoo!. “Yahoo! Games will safely and simply monetize our games experience while providing the best and most popular games free to game enthusiasts.”
Double Fusion will lend its core expertise, fusion.runtime(tm) technology and its veteran ad sales force to enable ad-supported Yahoo! games. Known for creative integrated marketing campaigns, Double Fusion connects brands with audiences through both systematic and custom-designed programs, through the immersive medium of games. For advertisers, the partnership brings the opportunity to access highly targeted reach to one of the most important consumer demographics — females 35 to 54 — at a time when they are fully engaged. Double Fusion is committed to enhancing player experiences as well as opening up new business models through ad-supported interactive entertainment. By embracing the advertising model and working with Double Fusion, Yahoo! is able to make more games available, for longer or in some cases unlimited free trials.
“We’re thrilled to be partnering with Yahoo! Games to bring our fusion.runtime technology to their large portfolio of high quality downloadable casual games,” said Jonathan Epstein, President and CEO of Double Fusion. “We believe there is a game out there for everyone and our dynamic ad-serving solution and sales experience provides Yahoo! Games an opportunity to finally integrate ad campaigns on-the-fly to their mass audience of 18-49 year old game-loving consumers.”
Yahoo! will leverage NeoEdge’s industry leading NeoARM(TM) ad enabling technology along with the NeoAds(TM) advertising network and NeoEdge ad sales team to deliver a comprehensive suite of advertising supported casual games. The NeoEdge solution brings Yahoo! a powerful and efficient way to insert ads into its extensive game library without requiring the game source code. NeoEdge enables advertisers to reach the key female demographic through one of the stickiest forms of online entertainment. NeoEdge’s singular focus is the casual game space, where a seamless consumer experience is paramount. With NeoEdge, advertisers have a proven medium to utilize highly targeted video advertising and publishers and portals benefit from the ease of implementation.
“NeoEdge is delighted to partner with Yahoo! Games to roll out ad-supported premium casual games to the world’s largest audience,” said Alex Terry, CEO of NeoEdge. “More consumers are going online for their entertainment. NeoEdge is creating new and unique ways for brands to establish engaging one-to-one relationships with those consumers while they play games.”
At launch, ad-supported downloadable games on Yahoo! Games will be available from top publishers including Alawar Entertainment, Anarchy, Big Fish Games, eGames, Floodgate, Freeze Tag, FreshGames, Funkitron, Gogii Games, GameHouse, Gamemill Publishing, HipSoft, I-Play, iWin, Last Day of Work, Legacy Interactive, Ludia, MumboJumbo, pixelStorm, PlayFirst, Playrix Entertainment, PopCap, Reflexive Entertainment, Sandlot Games, Sugar Games, TellTale Games, TikGames, uclick, Worldwide Biggies and Zero G Games.
July 10th, 2008
Yahoo! today announced the global availability of two new e-mail domains that will give users the chance to register for the e-mail address or Yahoo! ID they have always wanted. People can finally say goodbye to CutiePie4Ever80 or mattclark1977@yahoo.com and get a new Yahoo! e-mail address at ymail.com and rocketmail.com.
Yahoo! Mail is the number one Web mail service in the world with more than 260 million users worldwide(1). As a result of its global popularity, many desirable e-mail addresses have already been taken for the yahoo.com domain, as well as for localized versions of the namespace in countries around the world. With the two new e-mail domain choices, Yahoo! will make millions of new e-mail addresses available to the online community.
Yahoo! recently commissioned a survey conducted by Harris Interactive(R) to determine what online adults look for when choosing an e-mail address and found some noteworthy results:
– The majority of online adults (59 percent) consider the most important attribute of an e-mail address to be that it is easy to remember.
– When asked if they could choose any e-mail address for personal use, seven in ten online adults (70 percent) would opt to have some portion of their name included – 31 percent would want their last name included, 27 percent would choose their first name, while 28 percent would prefer to have their nickname as part of their e-mail address.
– Of online adults who indicated that they are not currently using their first choice e-mail address, over half (54 percent) agree that they want their e-mail address to reflect who they are, and about half (48 percent) would be at least somewhat likely to change addresses should their preferred choice become available.
“We recognize that people want an e-mail address that reflects who they are, whether they are signing up for an e-mail address for the first time, or simply updating their e-mail pseudonym to reflect the stage they are at in life,” said John Kremer, vice president, Yahoo! Mail. “We are thrilled to be able to offer new Yahoo! e-mail domain choices to Internet users, along with the same great Web mail experience that hundreds of millions of people have already come to expect.”
E-mail addresses at the new domains will have the same great Yahoo! Mail features as addresses at the yahoo.com domain, including:
– Unlimited storage – Yahoo! Mail provides all users with free unlimited e-mail storage(2)
– Integrated Instant Messaging and Text Messaging – Users can connect in real-time to their contacts with Yahoo! Messenger or Windows Live(R) Messenger and send text messages to friends on the go, right from their Yahoo! Mail inbox
– Protection from spam and viruses – All of the same great protection that is built into Yahoo! Mail will apply to these new domains. Yahoo! uses advanced technologies and data from numerous sources to dramatically reduce the delivery of spam and phishing e-mails
– Country-specific e-mail account – When signing up for an e-mail account, users have the option of choosing localized country versions from each of the Yahoo! domains: yahoo.com, ymail.com and rocketmail.com
As always, a Yahoo! ID will work for everything across the Yahoo! Network, from checking e-mail to checking out Messenger, Flickr, Groups, Sports, Finance and more.
In many markets, Yahoo! will also help users transfer their e-mail and contacts to their new address and notify friends of their new e-mail address.
In addition, Yahoo! has reserved a number of desirable e-mail addresses – all related to charitable organizations – using the new domains and will put these e-mail addresses up for charity auction beginning on Thursday, June 19, 2008. Yahoo! is working with auction partners eBay Giving Works and Auction Cause. The proceeds from the auction will benefit the following organizations: The Breast Cancer Research Foundation, Ocean Conservancy, Point Foundation, Right To Play and World Wildlife Fund. To participate in the online auction, please visit http://www.ebay.com/ymail.
Users can learn more about and register for a new e-mail at ymail.com and rocketmail.com at http://mail.yahoo.com.
June 22nd, 2008
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