Yahoo Groups

“Friends, I have noticed lately that we've been exchanging many ideas about kites, as well as announcements about events in the coming season. I knew that there could be a more efficient way of exchanging our ideas via email so that everyone gets to participate without having to maintain lengthy address lists. I already knew about some of the exciting things people were doing with so called "virtual communities", so I decided to look into it further. Most of the search engine companies offer free services to any sort of club and many free virtual communities exist on the www.
-Mark Kunoff, Hoosier Kitefliers Society

This quick note by this gentleman to all of his Kiteflier colleagues is an example of how Yahoo saw a need for online collaboration and capitalized on it. In June of 2000, Yahoo acquired an online group collaboration platform company called egroups. Yahoo was able to boost its communications offering, including mail, messenger and clubs according to Larry Dignan Staff Writer, CNET News. In this way, Yahoo provides the ability for massive mailing lists or discussion groups to be formed in an easy manageable way. Anyone can search and find a group they would like to subscribe to, or create a group of their own. Collaboration and communication to the masses becomes quick and efficient.

Developing a group is easy, it only requires that you specify public or private membership and choose a newsletter-only type membership or a collaborative membership. Once you've set up the basics, you need to add members to your group. You can do this by either sending out a blast email invitation, or entering members yourself. If the size of the group is too large then this can be somewhat of a deterrent. This has been a great way for associations or organizations to share information and collaborate on a large scale. For example, there is a group call Ruthie’s List developed by a human resources practitioner whereby job leads and information is shared pertaining to the human resources industry/function. This group has over 3000 members who share this common interest and association.

Sources
CNET News – Larry Dignan, April 2001,http://news.cnet.com/Yahoo-acquires-privately-held-eGroups/2100-12_3-259494.htmlWikipedia – The History of Yahoo – accessed on December 1, 2009