How Yahoo! Killed WebRing
from the death-by-obsolescence dept
I have to admit that even when webrings were huge (kinda like blogging now?) I never really thought it was that interesting. I mean, what’s so difficult about linking to other sites you like? Anyway, others felt differently about it, and some thought webrings (and specifically the company WebRing) were the next big thing. So, here’s the story about how WebRing was essentially destroyed by Yahoo!. WebRing (like so many other dot coms) was a company that was built out of a hobby project created by a high schooler. However, somewhere along the way, GeoCities realized that webrings could help tie their “communities” together (remember when GeoCities wouldn’t shut up about their “communities”?). Unfortunately, GeoCities bought WebRing right before Yahoo! swallowed GeoCities. While GeoCities had big plans for WebRing, Yahoo! never took the time to find out what they were, and changed and modified the system, pissing off its most loyal users. Finally, Yahoo! has sold WebRing back to one of the earliest people in charge of it – but many feel that it’s too late.
