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Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

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Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#171
post #140
post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does that matter? Those users aren't paying. Yahoo could very well kick 9/10ths of Tumblr's userbase off the site while retooling to make a profit from the other 10%, and it wouldn't change a single thing about their financials. To put it another way: right now, Tumblr is making no money for Yahoo. Destroying the site and its reputation to make it into something profitable is actually the sensible move, compared to j…

Tumblr is a content machine. Killing 90% of your userbase means killing most of your content.

What good is that content, if you're not monetizing it, from a bottom-line standpoint? You're actually losing money hosting all that content, paying for servers, storage, and bandwidth, if you're not making back something from it.

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#172

What about Yahoo Answers? I hate seeing their results show up in the top 3 when I do a Google search. They're always low quality and not useful.

Blast Yahoo Answers back to hell by installing a Chrome extension called Google Search Filter: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-search-filt... Add Experts-Exchange to the blacklist while you're at it.

I think Google has done a pretty good job at blacklisting Expert-sExchange. I don't remember the last time they turned up in my search results.

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#173
post #113
post #30

What the fuck is a content vertical?

Was it really necessary to drop an F bomb to ask this question?

As a European I find the phrase "dropping an F bomb" far more offensive than the word "fuck".

"Fuck" is an expletive based on a slang term for sexual intercourse. "Dropping bombs" is a violent military act that results in horribly maiming and murdering people, often including civilians.

Get your priorities straight.

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#174
post #42
post #30

What the fuck is a content vertical?

The development of such language ("content verticals") indicates the transition of a maturing industry from the founders/builders to the executives/gate keepers. They create such language to inflate the value of their executive work which is necessary in corporate politics, as opposed to the value creation process of founders who build new things and call them simply.

>indicates the transition of a maturing industry from the founders/builders to the executives/gate keepers.

Is that what you think? It certainly gave me pause; "startups" are some of the worst offenders when it comes to spewing jargon.

>as opposed to the value creation process of founders who build new things and call them simply.

Oh brother...

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#175
post #173
post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was it really necessary to drop an F bomb to ask this question?

As a European I find the phrase "dropping an F bomb" far more offensive than the word "fuck". "Fuck" is an expletive based on a slang term for sexual intercourse. "Dropping bombs" is a violent military act that results in horribly maiming and murdering people, often including civilians. Get your priorities straight.

I'm sorry if you were offended, but "dropping a bomb" is a common idiomatic expression that has nothing to do with physical violence. It simply means, "to say something shocking or unexpected."

http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/drop+a+bomb

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#176

Does anyone have concrete evidence that Tumblr didn't get axed? I don't think the article said anything about it, unless that falls under "lifestyle".

"Content verticals" are their magazine-type news-ish sites, with in-house and/or syndicated content. Tumblr is user generated content, and is probably the only part of Yahoo that isn't in active decline; they're unlikely to axe it, though they still need to figure out how to make money on it.

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#177
post #147
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then it's pretty silly to shutdown verticals as they most likely share the same source code as the rest. When you consider most SW companies try to establish as many revenue streams with as little people possible, cutting verticals is the last thing you want to do. Instead they should figure out how to share as much code as possible. But hey, it's Yahoo!

When I left Yahoo travel in 2011, and there wasn't much shared source between verticals. We shared the same software stack (mostly), where that includes os, web server, PHP, MySQL, yui, a search engine, sometimes a PHP framework, but all of the pages were pretty specific to the vertical. Generic pages wouldn't work very well -- details for a hotel aren't really that similar to details for a car; and genericizing it m…

OK, that explains it! Seems like "fiefdomization" of verticals is widespread :-(

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think every field has its own subset of language that makes most sense to them. I am sure a lot of words that make perfect unambiguous sense to tech people, would confuse non-tech people who would say "why don't you simply say it like..." The term "vertical" seems to be common amongst executives. I first came across the term when my father asked about the verticals of companies I was applying to. It appears to mean…

A vertical in MBA-speak is a specialised niche market which typically has plenty of competition. It's eccentric to consider - say - food journalism as a vertical, because it really isn't. But then "We're closing some of our online magazines" wouldn't sound nearly as decisive and strategic-y.

I don't think you can usually draw any conclusions regarding either 'niche status' or 'presence/lack of competition' from the word vertical.

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#179
post #42
post #30

What the fuck is a content vertical?

The development of such language ("content verticals") indicates the transition of a maturing industry from the founders/builders to the executives/gate keepers. They create such language to inflate the value of their executive work which is necessary in corporate politics, as opposed to the value creation process of founders who build new things and call them simply.

Uh... yeah, that's why the startup industry has absolutely no trade language, right?

Re: Yahoo is shutting down about half of its content verticals

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Content categories" would probably work fine.

But it's more than a content category. It's not like "Posts tagged with 'Entertainment'". It's more like a sub domain. entertainment.yahoo.com vs finance.yahoo.com Edit: fashion.yahoo.com isn't real, so I changed it to entertainment.yahoo.com

It really isn't.
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