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Yahoo Messenger to shut down on July 17
Web services provider Yahoo is set to put its instant messaging app to rest.
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Web services provider Yahoo is set to put its instant messaging app to rest. (Shutterstock.com/Vdovichenko Denis)
O
ath Inc., the umbrella company of Yahoo! announced on Friday that it would be shutting down the instant messaging app Yahoo Messenger on July 17, according to TechCrunch via Yahoo Finance
Yahoo Messenger, a chat service that was introduced in 1998 was very popular. It also launched a newer version in 2015, and another revamped version in August 2016. The latter came with a completely new design and many new features, including “unsend” that allowed users to undo sending messages.
NDTV noted that Yahoo tried to revive its messenger service by updating its Android and iOS apps last December.
However, the popularity of Yahoo Messenger, despite the revamp, saw a decline due to the dominance of similar services such as Facebook’s WhatsApp, WeChat, Line, and many others.
Current users of the soon-to-shut-down messenger service will be redirected to the new group messaging app Squirrel. Yahoo started testing the new app last month.
Read also: Facebook scans what you send other people on Messenger App
Tech Crunch also said that Yahoo would enable users to download chat history on Messenger for the next six months. Files would be saved in computers or devices, but not in another messaging app.
Oath Inc., a subsidiary of Verizon communications said that it would continue to experiment and consider how and if it could continue to thrive in the messaging landscape. (mut)
