Yahoo! To Close Some Services

By: Zain Nabi  |   March 4th, 2013   |   News

Yahoo has announced to close seven of its services that it deems unfit for the present time. The services that will be no longer available after this month include Yahoo Avatars, Yahoo app for BlackBerry, Yahoo Clues (beta), Yahoo App Search, Yahoo Sports IQ, Yahoo Message Boards website and Yahoo Updates API.

 

The change in Yahoo’s product line-up is aimed at improving the user experience by providing them more inspiring and entertaining services, and authorities at Yahoo are of the view that the mentioned services no longer take care of the users.

 

Yahoo Avatars will shut down from April 01. Those who have Yahoo Avatars and want to save them can download them and edit them as per their needs. The users can also continue using Yahoo Avatars on their profiles. Yahoo said:

 

“Effective April 1, 2013, we will no longer support Yahoo! Avatars across our properties. If you like your existing avatar and want to keep it, please go to the Avatars download page, pick a picture size and format, and click the appropriate download button. Similarly, if you want to edit your avatar, you can download the image and then use a photo editing service of your preference. If you want to continue using your avatar with our products, go to Yahoo! Profile and upload the avatar you downloaded.”

 

Yahoo will also not support the Avatars YQL table now from the effective date. Yahoo BlackBerry app will also be unavailable from April 01. Those who have already downloaded the app can continue to use it but Yahoo will not actively support it.

 

Yahoo Clues (beta) and Yahoo app search will also shut down from April 01, while Yahoo Updates API will be unavailable after April 16. As far as Yahoo Sports IQ is concerned, it will also shut down from April 01, but “your final lifetime Sports IQ score and rank will be automatically transferred to and preserved within your Yahoo! Fantasy Profile.”

 

Yahoo said about its message boards that will also shut down from April 01:

 

“Our message boards on individual properties (like Yahoo! Finance and Yahoo! Fantasy Sports) will remain active. We also encourage you to ask and answer questions on Yahoo! Answers, and discuss issues in the comments section on Yahoo! News.”