Snapchat, Yahoo not built to last

Google’s recent decision to shut down its social network, Google Plus, got me thinking about which internet services are built to last and which aren’t.
I’ve used a lot of internet services over the years and quite a few didn’t survive. In most cases, there were competing services available to fill the gap. In the case of online content, those failed websites just disappeared.
When I think about online services that likely won’t stand the test of time, two come to mind: Snapchat and Yahoo.
If Snapchat disappeared tomorrow, I don’t think anyone would really care. The multimedia messaging app for smartphones is getting its butt kicked by Facebook’s Instagram. Snapchat user growth has stalled and parent company Snap has made a bunch of missteps.
Instagram just surpassed Snapchat as the most-used social media app among U.S. teens, according to Piper Jaffray’s latest semiannual Taking Stock With Teens Survey.
In its third-quarter report last week, Snap said it had 186 million daily active users, down 1% compared with the prior quarter. So, it looks like the service has peaked.
As for Yahoo, it was fading for years when Verizon Communications bought Yahoo’s core internet businesses in June 2017. I’ve noticed a marked decline in the quality of Yahoo’s services including Yahoo Mail and Yahoo Finance over the past few years. The Verizon purchase didn't stop the decline.
Verizon rolled the Yahoo assets into a new company with the former AOL and called it Oath.
Last week, Verizon said Oath revenue fell 7% year over year to $1.8 billion in the third quarter. It also acknowledged that it is unlikely to meet the longer-term targets it set for Oath.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Verizon ends up selling off Oath piecemeal. After all, in April, it sold Yahoo’s Flickr photo-hosting service to SmugMug.

First step to combat fake news: End lying clickbait

If websites are serious about combating fake news, they should dump content sharing services that mislead users.
They need to hold content promotion services like Taboola, Outbrain and Revcontent accountable for carrying lying clickbait. Such clickbait articles use fake photos, false or misleading headlines and other dishonest tricks to get web surfers to click on their articles.
Recently two major news sites that I visit have stopped using Taboola sponsored links in favor of financial services ad platform Dianomi, a more credible service.
Taboola, Outbrain and Revcontent need to do a better job policing the content they carry. If they don’t they should suffer lost business. Plain and simple.
Lying clickbait adds to the internet stew of fake information, which is also being spread by social media.
Need some fresh examples of the kind of lying clickbait they run? Check out the latest samples below.

Taboola ran a photo of a naked female hitchhiker with a post headlined “Captivating photos from Woodstock you have to see to believe.” But it’s not from Woodstock, it’s from an advertisement for Landlubber clothes.
This one has been kicking around for a while with Woodstock pictorials. See the HoaxEye article “Pictures of Woodstock festival that aren’t.”

Revcontent ran an article titled “28 unauthorized photos of life in North Korea” using a photo from a Chinese TV series called “Special Forces Fire Phoenix.” It’s a fictional show about a female special forces unit that was criticized for being too sexy by the People’s Liberation Army military newspaper.
Photos from this series have been used to promote other supposed North Korea pictorials. See my earlier post titled “Lying clickbait: Close-but-no-cigar edition.”
For more on the show “Special Forces Fire Phoenix,” check out these articles by the Beijing News and DramaFever.

Outbrain ran a fake photo of a giant squid washed up on the beach for an article titled “Meet the most gigantic beasts on the planet. 36 images.”
The image is a composite of pictures of a much smaller dead squid and of people looking at a beached whale.
See articles by Snopes.com and WafflesAtNoon.

A clickbait article on Yahoo, which doesn’t identify its content promotion services, used a Photoshopped picture of a giant snake swimming past a family crossing flood waters. It used the phony picture to promote an article titled “15 huge animals you won’t believe actually exist.”
A photo of the snake without the family can be found online.

Revcontent promoted an article titled “Celebs who died and no one said a word” using photos of the very much alive actress Sara Gilbert. It paired her picture with the photo of a homeless woman named Pixie, implying that they are the same person. The photo of Pixie is by Megan Arroyo.

Purveyors of lying clickbait often use pictures of living celebrities with articles about dead celebrities to exploit the curiosity gap.
Below are clickbait articles that imply that actress Sally Field and game show host Vanna White have died.

Lying clickbait: Celebrity libel edition

Today on Yahoo Finance I saw a sponsored article that went beyond lying clickbait and stepped into the libel zone.
The promoted article titled “The 30 craziest drug transformations” implies that actor Steve Zahn has turned into a drug-crazed criminal. It features side-by-side photos of Zahn and a disheveled man in a mug shot. It implies the two are one in the same.
I searched online and found the mystery photo belonged to a man named Trevor Newbauer who reportedly had been arrested for disorderly conduct. The mug shot has been featured in multiple photo compilations of funny mug shots, rednecks and mullets.
Yahoo did not provide information about which online content distributor is responsible for the post. The post says only “Sponsored” in light print. Yahoo is one of the least transparent organizations when it comes to providing information on sponsored articles.
A Yahoo FAQ on its ad policies reveals that it works with numerous third-party advertising partners, including Adblade and Outbrain.
Linking a person, even a public figure, to a crime or drug abuse are among the major red flags in libel law.
This sort of lying clickbait could be damaging to Zahn’s career and livelihood.
All it would take is one casting director who sees this ad and makes a decision not to cast Zahn because of it.

The 15 most controversial magazine covers of 2016

Race, Photoshop and Donald Trump were factors in some of the most controversial magazine covers of 2016.

Sports Illustrated, Swimsuit 2016

Sports Illustrated featured plus-size model Ashley Graham as one of the cover models for its annual spring swimsuit issue. Some people didn’t like that.
Former supermodel Cheryl Tiegs disagreed with the decision to use Graham in the issue.
“I don’t like that we’re talking about full-figured women because it’s glamorizing them because your waist should be smaller than 35 (inches). That’s what Dr. Oz said, and I’m sticking to it,” she told E! News. “I don’t think it’s healthy.”

Adweek, April 4, 2016

For the second year in a row, a magazine cover featuring Kerry Washington came under fire for Photoshopping the actress.
Washington said her picture on the April 4, 2016, cover of Adweek was Photoshopped so much that she didn’t recognize herself. Fans also complained on social media about the cover shot, according to the Daily Mail.
In 2015, InStyle magazine was criticized for lightening the skin tone of the African American actress.

Vogue, September 2016

When reality-TV star Kendall Jenner landed the prestigious September cover of Vogue, some fans of the fashion bible were irate.
Lots of people took to social media to write “RIP Vogue” for the move.
(See article by the Daily Mail.)

The Economist, April 2-8, 2016

Chinese authorities blocked access to the Economist website and app after the magazine printed a satirical cover depicting Chinese President Xi Jinping as a Mao-era communist.
(See article by Quartz.)

Discovery Girls, April-May 2016

A cover article about swimsuits for young girls in an issue of Discovery Girls, for ages 8 to 13, got a lot of people upset.
The magazine was accused of body-shaming for the article titled “What Swimsuit Best Suits You?”
(See articles by US magazine, Health, Today and Cosmopolitan.)

Girl’s Life, July 2016

A graphic designer fed up with the content of magazines for girls made her own cover of Girl’s Life. Using the July 2016 issue as a template, she replaced cover lines about fashion and beauty with motivational ones about life and careers.
(See articles by the Daily Mail, Women You Should Know and the Huffington Post.)

Variety, May 2016

Variety raised eyebrows with its cover depicting Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer as a Christ-like figure carrying a cross.
(See article by Business Insider.)

Maxim India, June-July 2016

Maxim India was criticized for Photoshopping the armpit of actress Priyanka Chopra to look unrealistically smooth.
(See articles by the Daily Mail, MSN and another by the Daily Mail.)

Conde Nast Traveller, Oct.-Nov. 2016

Priyanka Chopra was again the subject of controversy with an Indian edition of Conde Nast Traveller.
She was criticized for wearing an insensitive “refugee” tank top on the cover.
(See articles by the Hollywood Reporter and the Daily Mail.)

Time, Oct. 3, 2016

Time magazine stirred up controversy by featuring NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick on its cover, showing him kneeling for the national anthem in protest.
(See articles by the Daily Mail and SB Nation.)

BlackHair, December 2016

U.K.'s BlackHair magazine issued an apology to readers for featuring a white model, Emily Bador, on the cover of its December/January issue.
(See articles by Chron and People.)

New York, Oct. 31, 2016

Just days before the 2016 presidential election, New York magazine featured an unflattering image of candidate Donald Trump that branded him “LOSER.” Wrong. He won the race.
(See article by Adweek.)

Newsweek, Special Commemorative Edition

Newsweek erred the other way. It accidentally released a special commemorative edition that featured Hillary Clinton as the winner of the 2016 presidential election. It quickly recalled the “Madam President” issue.
(See articles by US magazine, the Guardian, the New York Post and a follow-up article, MSN and Express.)

People, Nov. 21, 2016

People magazine took heat from some corners for its positive coverage of Donald Trump in its cover story on the election.
(See articles by the Daily Mail, the Huffington Post, Mashable and the New York Post.)

Time, Dec. 19, 2016

Time pissed off some people with its pick of Donald Trump as its “Person of the Year.”
(See articles by Forward and the Hollywood Reporter.)

Yahoo: A supporter of lying clickbait articles

Until now, my articles on lying clickbait have focused on the content promotion services that use the technique, such as Taboola and Revcontent.
Today, I’m going to focus on a sponsor of lying clickbait: Yahoo.
Yahoo is pretty desperate to increase its advertising revenue, so it has turned to unscrupulous content marketing services to goose its numbers.
Yahoo Finance has cluttered up its news feed with cheap ads for herbal medicines, get rich quick schemes, and “proven” ways to attract women. It also added sponsored content using lying clickbait photos.
One promoted article titled “Rebel Wilson Looks Amazing After Losing Weight” used a Photoshopped picture of the actress made to look thin.
The doctored photo is part of a series of photos done by groups on Facebook and Reddit that digitally slim down plus-sized celebrities. The Facebook group is called Project Harpoon and the Reddit subpage is called Thinner Beauty. (See article by the Daily Mail.)

Another promoted article titled “Images of the Titanic Taken by Passenger’s Camera” used a photo from the 1943 German propaganda film “Titanic.”
The sponsored post claims, “Rare Photos from Inside the Titanic Revealed to the World for the First Time.”
Hardly. (See articles on the 1943 film on Wikipedia and IMDb.)

Yahoo also has used some lying clickbait seen elsewhere, such as Erik Estrada and Bruno Mars in a post titled “Celebrity Kids Who Could Impersonate Their Parents.”

And just for illustration purposes, here are some sponsored ads Yahoo has been running in its news feeds.

Hey, Yahoo, fix your glitchy websites

In recent years, Yahoo has chased shiny new opportunities like online content creation and mobile apps and taken its eye off its main services.
Once great services like Yahoo Mail and Yahoo Finance were left to stagnate.
Yahoo Mail has become slow and error prone. Yahoo’s recent tweaks to its email service haven’t improved it much. It trails Google’s Gmail in functionality and responsiveness.
Last week, Yahoo overhauled its Yahoo Finance website and the results were loudly criticized online by longtime users. It’s been called “the New Coke of the Internet.”
I’ve lost confidence in Yahoo to remain a web service I can count on for the long haul. I’m getting flashbacks to GeoCities.
I’ve documented the many error messages I get when using Yahoo services. They happen pretty frequently. I’ll include a few more with this post.

Earlier posts on the subject:

Yahoo needs to get its act together and fix its core services (May 14, 2016)

Note to Yahoo: Keep your eye on the ball (Nov. 22, 2015)

Yahoo fails continue (Feb. 17, 2015)

Photos: Standard Yahoo error note (top), Yahoo Mail website not secure, Yahoo Mail fails to load, Yahoo banner ad fails, and error note about inability to add content to My Yahoo.

Yahoo Finance redesign getting terrible reviews, called ‘New Coke of the Internet’

Final bids for Yahoo’s core businesses reportedly are due Monday. Verizon and AT&T are among those in the running. But whoever buys Yahoo needs to keep what’s working and fix what’s broken in the web portal’s core operations.
That includes Yahoo Finance.
Last week Yahoo Finance overhauled the site and the results aren’t pretty. A Yahoo article touting the changes has garnered more than 1,000 comments, almost all negative. (The few positive comments are likely by trolls trying to elicit angry responses.)
Yahoo Finance has been a workhorse for investors and others who closely follow publicly traded companies. The changes have many longtime users talking about switching to other websites.
Changes to the Yahoo Finance ticker pages have made the service practically unusable for me. Now, instead of a neat list of up-to-the-minute company-related articles under a stock data table, we’re presented with an airy page of random articles interspersed with cheap-looking sponsored content.
What used to be an easy-to-scan summary of news articles about a company has become a hard-to-navigate mess of content.
What’s worse, when you click on an article now, it takes you to a summary page for that article. If you want to see the full article, you have to click a second button.
Obviously Yahoo is trying to drive page views at the expense of usability and customer satisfaction. It’s as if Yahoo wants to drive me to MarketWatch or some other financial news website.
I sense that Yahoo is making these changes for financial and cosmetic reasons, not to improve the service.
For now, at least, Yahoo hasn’t messed with its Yahoo Finance portfolio pages. Fingers crossed.

Here are some sample comments from users about the new Yahoo Finance:

“You have succeeded in making the site nearly unusable. I gather that you never bothered to ask your users how they were using the site. This isn’t an improvement, it is a disaster.” – John Bollinger, CFA, CMT

“I’ve used Yahoo Finance since 1996; the year I learned to use the internet and have never used any other site … this is a complete joke and it’s a sad day as I have made my decision to leave Yahoo after 20 years of what I thought was a very successful relationship.” – AR

“I’ve used Yahoo Finance since 1998. Hands down, it has been the best, for almost 2 decades … This latest change however, this ‘new format’ as you call it, is completely unusable.” – WaveR

“I dislike everything about this new finance site that fills up my entire screen with information of no value for me ... Thanks for screwing up a terrific finance site.” – Richard

“This will be relegated as an example in the Introduction to Marketing class as the NEW COKE of the Internet.” – God

“This will not do. People using finance tools need instant results … The linear setup Yahoo Finance had was great. The present site is a clustered mess. The home page is a bloated cow.” – Dan

“Please give us the choice of which format to use. I much prefer the older format. I have already looked elsewhere for financial info due to the cumbersome nature of the new format.” – A Yahoo reader

“I have been a Yahoo Finance user for decades and cannot begin to express my extreme disappointment in your recent makeover of this site. The financial information from the discarded site was simple to access and easily navigated. The ‘improved’ Yahoo Finance is a joke … Please listen to us, your loyal users for decades, and scrap this new finance page and bring back what was the absolute, hands down best finance site on the internet. I cannot and will not use your new, ‘improved’ finance page and will look for another source of financial information.” – Glatt

“I have switched to MarketWatch. I did not switch because I love MarketWatch, I don’t, but Yahoo Finance has totally abandoned those of us who appreciated a concise website for company stock prices, financial and historical information, and relevant news. I have been with Yahoo Finance for over two decades, and this feels like a break up with a good friend who wanted to hook up with some pretty face, but no brains. Maybe next time the ‘engineers’ will actually talk to real users, instead of other engineers who say ‘Hey bro, that looks cool.’” – SS

“New and improved, are you kidding us all. It may look more ‘jazzy’ and ‘trending’ but not much emphasis was put into what the users want.” – David

“THIS IS A TOTAL FAILURE, everybody is looking for a different site. Whoever was in charge of this is clueless about what the stock market is. This site is used by adults, not silly kids. I hope soon you have no users at all.” – The Verdugos

“After 25+ years of using Yahoo to EASILY get access to and download data, I'll have to try one or more other places to replace what has been lost by the changes you have introduced.” – Charlie

“What an incredibly misguided move. There is nothing positive that I can say about your new/improved setup. For years, Yahoo Finance has been an excellent resource. Whoever designed this schmozzle needs to be shown the door at the same time as the site is returned to its former, usable self.” – Brian

“Yahoo Finance was the only last part of Yahoo that was any good. Now that is gone! I will go somewhere else for my financial data.” – Meohmy 

There are many more similar comments.

Yahoo needs to get its act together and fix its core services

Yahoo is up for sale and executives there are probably distracted right now. But the old-school Internet company needs to buckle down and fix its core web services.
As I’ve stated on multiple occasions, I’m a longtime Yahoo user, particular Yahoo Finance and Yahoo Mail. But they have been glitchy for some time now. (I’ve hammered Yahoo on its glitchy web services several times before, most recently last November.)
I like to keep multiple web browser tabs open and lately the one that seems to crash my browser a lot is Yahoo Finance. My browser (Firefox) will lock up and eventually I’ll eventually have to restart the application.
Perhaps it’s because Yahoo has so many apps running in the background of its webpages. Recently my Ghostery app recorded 74 advertising and analytics trackers running on a Yahoo Finance page. That’s at least double what I usually see on news websites.
The glitches I’ve encountered on Yahoo webpages include articles, stock tables and emails not loading. Sometimes the ads don’t load, but that’s just embarrassing for Yahoo.

Earlier posts on the subject:

Note to Yahoo: Keep your eye on the ball (Nov. 22, 2015)

Yahoo fails continue (Feb. 17, 2015)

Yahoo Finance portfolio failing to load.

Yahoo advertising fail.

Photos: Screenshots of recent Yahoo fails.