Founded by David Filo and Jerry Yang, graduate students at Stanford University, Yahoo! was incorporated on the 2nd of March, 1995. Initially, the site was called “Jerry and David’s Guide to the World Wide Web” but as it grew in popularity, it was renamed Yahoo!, an acronym for “Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle”. Back then, it was only meant to be a useful guide to navigate the world wide web, and not a business. Today, Yahoo! provides users with information, online utilities, and access to other websites. Its features include a search engine, an email service, a news branch, and a directory.
In the late 1990s, Yahoo! was among the major players in the internet frenzy. Although some losses were sustained, it even survived the collapse of numerous internet-based companies in 2001-2002. With multiple major moves, the company remained a notable name in the industry. It battled Google for many years to retain a higher share of the search engine market. It released its Yahoo! Instant Messenger and bought out Flickr, the internet photo network. Another astonishing step was its acquisition of a 40% share of Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant. Throughout the years, Yahoo has made multiple attempts at reorganisation and reconstruction, with David Filo believing that “technology is about constant reinvention”.
Although Yahoo! has lost its footing now, for some time in recent history, it was the biggest internet phenomenon. In fact, when the company was only 5 years old, it was worth more than Ford, Chrysler, and GM combined. Many of the apps and services that the internet is filled with today were either invented by Yahoo! or soon found a home there (Broadcast.com, Flickr, Yahoo Notebook, Yahoo Music, etc.). It was, additionally, the pioneer of the pay-per-click advertising model. In 2017, Verizon acquired Yahoo! for $4.8 billion, ending the run of what was once deemed the king of the internet.