Yahoo! Messenger public chat rooms no more, move upsets users

BANGALORE, INDIA: As of December 14, 2012, all public chat rooms on Yahoo! Messenger have been shut down as part of a series of features being changed. While some users agree with the move, a majority of users of Yahoo chat are upset and have unleashed their rage on online forums.

''We have decided to discontinue several Yahoo! product features. This will enable us to refocus our efforts on modernizing our core Yahoo! products experiences and of course, create new ones,'' Yahoo had said in a web post earlier this month.

Yahoo has stopped some of the most popular products features and services that include Yahoo! Messenger public chat rooms and messenger Pingbox. As per the new changes, Pingbox will no longer be available on Yahoo Messenger and the company will assist users to uninstall Pingbox from blogs or social networks. Besides, Yahoo Messenger is no longer interoperable with Microsoft Windows Live messenger since yesterday.

Users upset with this decision have also started an online petition against closing down Yahoo Messenger public chat rooms. The petition called 'Stop Yahoo from closing down their chat rooms' is available on on the website - www.thepetitionsite.com. Already around 386 users from around the globe have signed this online petition against Yahoo and the number is still growing. However the aim is to get 1000 users to sign this online petition.

Several users have also threatened to boycott Yahoo, if public chat rooms feature is not brought back. ''I have been using Ychat for a LONG LONG TIME and met some of my bestest friends there.. I want chat rooms BACK! how dare you shut this down!! actually thinking about NOT using Yahoo anymore!'' says a CIOL viewer.

 ''If you wanna make things better for people then why take away the one thing that millions of people all over the world have been using for years. I've been on messenger for 13 years and have friends all the world, and now your just gonna shut it down. I for one will not have anything to do with Yahoo again. EVERYONE SPREAD THE WORD, BAN ANYTHING TO DO WITH YAHOO,'' says another CIOL viewer.

Several users have also migrated to other online chat forums like Paltalk. ''I'm done with all yahoo services, you blew it guys. If you feel the need to contact me ill be on pal talk from here on out,'' says one such user. However, there are some viewers who agree with Yahoo on this decision. ''''Far to many using it for the wrong reasons, it should have stopped multi id use a long time ago, it should also have guaranteed that users were of the legal age buy giving information via a passport no, driving licence no, or a nation insurance no, glad to see its closing its public chat rooms, would be nice if it could have kept the messenger side of it,'' says a user.

Despite the online rage, Yahoo Messenger public chat rooms is now not functional. When one clicks on the public chat rooms link, the following message is being displayed: ''Sorry, the page you requested was not found. Please check the web address for proper spelling and capitalization. If you're having trouble locating a destination on Yahoo! Messenger, try visiting our home page. Or use the box at right to search the Yahoo! Messenger site.''

What do you have to say? Should Yahoo consider bringing public chat rooms back? Or do you agree with Yahoo on this move? Do let us know.