[Devils Workshop] “How Yahoo’s Empire Crashed From $100 billion to $22 billion!” and 2 more...

How Yahoo’s Empire Crashed From $100 billion to $22 billion!
MyNeta – The ultimate guide to keep a watch on elections in India!
[Mobile] Nokia e7 coming to India in March 2011!

How Yahoo’s Empire Crashed From $100 billion to $22 billion!

Posted: 15 Feb 2011 05:00 AM PST

There is a popular saying that 'Rome was not built-in a day'. Yes, the Roman empire took hundreds of years to reach its pinnacle and eventually took a couple of centuries to be completely ruined. Throughout history we have seen large empires being brought down by the heady cocktail of lack of clarity from leaders, inflexible bureaucracy and in general a decline of ideas about the future. Basically most empires have collapsed when they became complacent about their position.

Yahoo seems to be a similar empire that is crumbling away piece by piece. This decline has been brutal and in times will probably get worse. Here is a sobering thought, in 1999 Dec, Yahoo was worth almost $100 Billion (Source). At the time of writing this post it is valued around $22 Billion (source). Just imagine, that it is today half of what Facebook is being valued at and more than 5-6 times less than what Google is valued at.

So where did such a massive decline begin? How did the once largest internet company get left behind?

The Yahoo Failures!

#1. Geocities:

About 10 years ago, if you wanted to create your own online page, most people did it on Geocities. I even like to think of Geocities as the birthplace of blogging industry to some extent. It was where people expressed themselves openly in their own little corner on the internet. Geocities was bought by Yahoo for a amazing $3.17 billion, and instead of making it into a Facebook or a great blogging platform, we saw a decline of Geocities with nothing new happening. Geocities was finally closed down in Oct 2009.

#2. Broadcast.com

Yahoo bought broadcast.com for a monstrous $5.7 billion. The company was supposed to be revolutionary for video. Another lost opportunity which was promptly snapped by companies like YouTube. Today if you visit broadcast.com it simply redirects the page back to Yahoo.

#3. SOLD.com.au

SOLD was a major competitor to eBay in Australia. In April 2001, Yahoo bought SOLD and decided to leverage it against eBay. Forget competing but within two years Yahoo shut the company down and redirected users to eBay!

#4. HotJobs

Another very successful portal for job-seekers which Yahoo purchased for $436 million and almost 10 years later sold it for almost half the price at $225 million to Monster.com.

#5. Delicious Bookmarks

Delicious bookmarks had a great opportunity to grow and was purchased by Yahoo for a mere $15 million. Today rumours still circulate that it will be shut down by Yahoo. Yahoo, publicly maintains they are planning to sell Delicious.

The strange decline

Yahoo, has had a strange record of taking over companies or web services which are hugely popular and successful and then turning them into nothingness. This is where they have lost literally billions of dollars over the last decade.

Yahoo had advertisements on their search before Google did, they also had created Yahoo instant search but discontinued it in 2005. Today Google has done the same in 2010 and saw a rise in their AdWords clicks. I shudder to think what would have happened to Google if Yahoo had purchased it back in 2003. Would Google even exist going by Yahoo's track record? I doubt it, Yahoo would have inefficiently dismantled it.

There is a downward spiral of Yahoo that has got so much momentum that it's decline is almost certain. Unfortunately a company that could have shaped the history of the internet in a big way, will end up being a mere footnote 10-15 years down the line.

What are you views on Yahoo? Will it make a turn around, or will it eventually crash and burn completely? Do drop in your comments.

-- This Post How Yahoo’s Empire Crashed From $100 billion to $22 billion! is Published on Devils Workshop .

MyNeta – The ultimate guide to keep a watch on elections in India!

Posted: 15 Feb 2011 03:35 AM PST

I have always been a strong advocate of the fact that IT is just not about Facebook or Twitter, it is about how we can change things around us in a better way. I had previously written about How to battle Corruption online with CVC and now in the similar league I am going to discuss about Myneta.info, a website-based concept by Association for Democratic Reforms which is all about publicly displaying data related to candidates who are contesting both State & National-level elections in India.

The data is sufficient enough to initially judge the kind of candidate you are going to vote for during the election process. The website displays information in tabular form about all candidates of Rajya Sabha (Lower House of the Parliament) and Lok Sabha (upper house). It even displays a separate list for the elected Members of Parliament (MP) for the recent elections. What is more interesting is that it even covers all the candidate data for the various State Assemblies alongwith a separate list of Members of Legislative Assembly (MLA). It even displays a comparison chart of different candidates of various parties. The only thing I did not like about this website is the Layout design which could have been much better.

The website even runs a National helpline number (1-800-110-440) and a SMS facility (Send Myneta [PINCODE] to 56070) which categorizes this website as a serious effort to improve our political system. We must join them in this effort and must exercise our Voting rights sincerely. Do post your comments on how do you find this website, is it useful or just another waste of time? It is time to share your views folks with everyone!

LINK: Myneta.info

-- This Post MyNeta – The ultimate guide to keep a watch on elections in India! is Published on Devils Workshop .

[Mobile] Nokia e7 coming to India in March 2011!

Posted: 15 Feb 2011 12:00 AM PST

It is a known fact that Nokia's sales are dwindling due to increased presence of Android, but that does not at all mean Nokia doing any compromise with it's quality it is known for. With the latest Nokia e7 already launched in selected European countries, is soon going to mark its presence in the Indian market too.

Nokia e7 boasts of Nokia's top-notch quality and improved functionalities.

Nokia e7 Specifications

Screen size: 4"
Full-QWERTY Keyboard
Resolution: 16:9 nHD AMOLED and 16 million colours (that is Awesome )
Capacitive touch screen (just like Apple iPhone)
All connectivity features including WLAN, HSDPA Cat9 (upto 10.2 Mbps) and HSUPA Cat5 (upto 2 Mbps)
8 Mega-pixel camera with dual LED Flash. A 3 MP front camera also.
160 GB Internal memory.
Read all the features here.

Watch the video below which inspires the making of Nokia e7:

a Video of Nokia e7

Just watch all the videos of the phone I have included here and you will find it amazing. Few sources claim the launch price of the phone to be around Rs. 26000. However that is a matter of speculation. Do leave your comments here and let me know what all kind of gadgets you are interested in.

Official Source: Nokia e7

-- This Post [Mobile] Nokia e7 coming to India in March 2011! is Published on Devils Workshop .