Farewell GeoCities

When Yahoo! users typed geocities.com on October 26, 2009, they got a
one-line banner message saying: GeoCities is closing down. In fact, in an
email sent out on July 17, 2009, Yahoo! had said, Dear Yahoo! India GeoCities
customer, were writing to let you know that Yahoo! India GeoCitiesour free
website building service and communityis closing on October 26, 2009. We have
enjoyed hosting GeoCities web sites, created by Yahoo! users all over the world,
and were proud of the community youve built. However, we have decided to focus
on helping our customers get online with our other great hosting service, Yahoo!
Small Business. On October 26, 2009, your GeoCities site will no longer appear
on the web, and you will no longer be able to access your GeoCities account and
files.

This move has sent mixed signals in the cyber space. For long, many things on
the web have remained free; while all providers have pay services, the free
hosting has remained an ideal platform for users to share and connect with
friends, and also gave an opportunity of owning a website. But this plain
vanilla web hosting concept seemed to have undergone the typical video killed
the radio star syndrome.

Just like RJs were marginalized with music TV, social networking sites have
cannibalized on these free web hosting services; and its claimed a victim as
big as GeoCities. As per reports available, displaced GeoCitizens can find a
new online home by purchasing Yahoos paid web hosting at very economical
introductory prices. Pretty smart strategy, assuming that a small population of
millions of free users opting for this introductory offer will translate into
huge revenues.

In the last one year, Yahoo is trying to re-invent itself to the changing
market dynamics; with social networking becoming a disruptive development, and
clearly the older dot.com models and strategies are a pass. For instance, Yahoo
acquired GeoCities for a whopping $3 bn plus a decade ago; and one of the
pioneers in building online communities at the height of the dotcom boom. Many
see the closure of GeoCities as part of the series of road to profitability
strategy initiated by Yahoos CEO, Carol Bartz; who took over the online giant
in January 2009. Bartz has initiated a range of cost cutting measures. Bartz as
head of design, software major- Autodesk, prior to joining Yahoo is seen a
turnaround executive. Bartz was credited for accelerating Autodesks revenues
from a mere $300 mn to a $1.5 bn enterprise in her thirteen year sojourn. So
clearly the mood at Yahoo is to cut on the freebie services like GeoCities, and
focus on new services that can get more advertising and subscription revenues.

GeoCities closure comes close on the heels of Yahoo shutting down its video
sharing service-Jumpcut in June 2009. It also sold its stake in Gmarket to
eBay, a South Korean e-commerce company some time back to raise about $120 mn.
Looking at all these parleys, Yahoo is inclined to focus more on its
fundamentals, and exiting all peripheral opportunities it forayed over the last
few years.

Coming back to GeoCities closure, its a sad day for the Internet boomers,
who rode on such great service. Its absence in the days ahead is sure to create
a void.

Shrikanth G

shrikanthg@cybermedia.co.in