It integrates features from Yahoo-owned Flickr, Tumblr, and Xobni.
By Sreejith Vallikunnu
Yahoo has launched a completely revamped version of its messaging platform, Yahoo Messenger, focused on mobile, group messaging and image sharing that integrates features from Yahoo-owned Flickr, Tumblr, and Xobni.
“We’ve made sharing, “unsending” and “liking” messages, photos and animated GIFs easy and insanely fast – unlike anything you’ve experienced before,” wrote Jeff Bonforte, SVP of Product & Engineering for Communication Products, Yahoo, in a statement.
The new messenger is available on iOS, Android, on the Web and in Yahoo Mail on the desktop. It lets one send hundreds of photos at a time and they will appear to everyone in the conversation almost instantly. One can also download the photos in original quality.
Another feature lets users “unsend” any message, photo or GIF, and it will vanish instantly from the conversation (not only from your view but everyone else’s too).
One can search and find the perfect GIF in the new Yahoo Messenger app too. With the help of Tumblr community, one get instant access to a virtually unlimited and ever-growing library of GIFs.
And if you’re offline, or have low connectivity (say when you’re flying or in a remote area), you can continue to use the app and send messages or photos. When you’re connected, Yahoo Messenger automatically sends them without you having to resend or refresh. Most of the competitors have failed to offer such an option.
You can also message anyone, even if they’re offline. They will receive an email notification with your message.
Like Yahoo Mail, the new Yahoo Messenger has a smart contacts system behind the scene, powered by Xobni’s industry-defining platform.
“Yahoo decided it was time to build a ground-up rewrite of the platform that was completely modern and prepares Yahoo to ship really disruptive innovative features,” said, Yahoo Messenger senior director of product management, Austin Shoemaker.
2 Comments
Darn… there dies the last useful piece of Yahoo. Every time Yahoo “innovates”, I dread the result.
Too little too late. They killed Yahoo Messenger user-created chat rooms and lost a huge base of users. Then they killed Yahoo 360 and lost another huge set of users.
Yahoo ‘News’ articles on the home page are barely news and mostly celebrity gossip.
The search engine isn’t really appealing.
Email has gotten worse and sluggish.
I agree with many people that Yahoo is a dying dinosaur. Been a user since 1999. Time to move on.