The PhoneBoy Blog

I can’t remember the last time I willingly used any product of Yahoo’s aside from Flickr. Personally, I try and be a company man and use my employer’s offering in the space.  So why do I care about Yahoo? Why does anyone care about Yahoo?

I got to thinking about this when I saw Andy Abramson’s post about Yahoo getting ditched by AT&T and Verizon. The carriers aren’t ditching Yahoo so much as they’re not bringing Yahoo along as the carrier’s upgrade from DSL to FIOS.

Back when these initial deals were made, the carriers didn’t understand the Internet. Some would say the carriers still don’t, but they understand it better now. Yahoo was a strong Internet brand back then, so it seemed to make sense to partner with them to help bring the masses online.

More and more people know how to get online and don’t need a portal like Yahoo to help them find their way. They either know or they ask Google where to go.

The actions and words of Yahoo are pretty quiet. They aren’t making any noise–good or bad. When leadership changes and market share continues decline, silence is simply not an option if Yahoo is to remain viable.

But then again, why do I care? Why does anyone care, except maybe as someone that can keep Google in check?