A tip for Yahoo

Thursday, March 8, 2001 by Dave Winer.

On News.Com 

"..Koogle lamented that Internet companies had erred by giving away too much content to consumers in the dash to gain market share and notoriety. Consumers have been loathe to pay for any Internet content, from news bulletins to stock tips to downloadable music and software."

http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-5058314.html?tag=ch_mh

I have a tip for Yahoo. There are some services you could start charging for right now. Do a little development and come up with eGroups/Pro. Use a more professional template (less Yahoo branding and no ads), and charge $100 per year to run it. Make the archives available for download in XML. That's it.

I'm on a lot of eGroups mail lists, where we do real work, and I worry about them. I'd be happy to pay for the service if I can make sure that we can migrate easily if Yahoo restructures. Open systems, follow the grain of the Web, and charge a reasonable fee.

Scott Loftesness adds: "eGroups/Pro should allow the 'owner' to charge subscribers participation fees and do a revenue share-back to Yahoo."

Dave Winer