Almost no one really uses old instant messengers anymore like we used to back in the day, however there are those to this day that still actually use old IM apps for whatever reason. They probably don’t want to switch to anything else, but as of August 5th Yahoo Messenger will be closing down for good after 18 years of being around. Back in 1998, Yahoo came out with “Yahoo Pager” to rival MSN Messenger and AOL Messenger. AOL Messenger was shuttered back in 2012 and MSN Messenger followed suit in 2014 only leaving Yahoo behind. Even though Yahoo came out with a modern day app last year, it’s finally time to close down the old app.
UPDATE (6/25/2016 11:25ET): We wrote that AOL Messenger was shuttered back in 2012 which is partially true but not entirely accurate. The AOL Messenger development team was dissolved in 2012 shutting down the apps development. But AOL Messenger is still being used today and there is support being offered.
Yahoo did have this to say as to why it’s shutting down:
While today we provide basic interoperation between the legacy product and the new Messenger, we encourage all of our users to complete their transition to the new Yahoo Messenger as we will no longer support the legacy platform as of August 5, 2016. We intend to continue our focused efforts on the new Messenger, with a goal of delivering the best experience to our users.
To this day, there are actually people who are still using this fossil of an IM, and the two groups are mainly oil traders who bid and gossip on commodities prices, and users in the Asia-Pacific region. Of course just these two groups definitely won’t be enough to keep an old app going. As mentioned earlier, on August 5th, Yahoo Messenger will be closing down and users will no longer be able to log in. If you need the new messenger app, you can find it in your phone’s app store.
When was the last time you used Yahoo Messenger, or any old instant messenger apps? Let us know by leaving your comments below, or on Google+, Facebook, or Twitter.
[button link=”https://www.engadget.com/2016/06/10/goodbye-old-yahoo-messenger/” icon=”fa-external-link” side=”left” target=”blank” color=”285b5e” textcolor=”ffffff”]Source: Engadget[/button]Last Updated on June 25, 2016.
