One of the things that strikes me as odd is when someone within a company thinks they are being funny, but they come off as being weird. You know like that guy at work that says funny stuff that makes you think he's cool for a second but then gives that really weird vibe that remind you to stay away from that person.
Yahoo's SVP of communications products Jeff Bonforte and CIO Randy Roumillat were trying to convince their employees that their overhaul of Yahoo email wasn't as bad as the public has been saying. We will be honest, we are one of the people that think Yahoo has to go. They are right up there with BlackBerry that needs to call it a day and close up shop.
However, they think they are still relevant. Even when only 25% of their staff has left their former corporate email of Outlook to their own email. The email has gone viral and no one from Yahoo is actually commenting on the email, which was cited by telling employees that "Windows 95 called and they want their mail app back."
Why this is coming up is because earlier this year, Yahoo asked their employees to switch over to Yahoo Mail for their own corporate email. Only a quarter of the staff actually changed. While they seem to try and make like of the situation, you can see that this is a weak attempt by Yahoo to remind their own employees that the company is still relevant and can be useless, er, I mean, useful.
Here is the email in its entirety, thanks to AllThingsD:
Hello Yahoos,
Earlier this year we asked you to move to Yahoo Mail for your corporate email account. 25% of you made the switch (thank you). But even if we used the most generous of grading curves (say, the one from organic chemistry), we have clearly failed in our goal to move our co-workers to Yahoo Mail.
It's time for the remaining 75% to make the switch. Beyond the practical benefits of giving feedback to your colleagues on the Mail team, as a company it's a matter of principle to use the products we make. (BTW, same for Search.)
For some reading this email, you are saying, "Jeff, shut up, you had me at hello." *hug* Jump over to yo/dogfood, click "Corp Mail/Cal/ Messenger" and you are ready to join our brave new world at yo/corpmail or .
For others, you might now be running in your head to a well worn path of justified resistance, phoning up the ol' gang, circling the hippocampian wagons of amygdalian resistance. Hold on a sec, pilgrim.
First, it doesn't feel like we are asking you to abandon some glorious place of communications nirvana. At this point in your life, Outlook may be familiar, which we can often confuse with productive or well designed. Certainly, we can admire the application for its survival, an anachronism of the now defunct 90s PC era, a pre-web program written at a time when NT Server terrorized the data center landscape with the confidence of a T-Rex born to yuppie dinosaur parents who fully bought into the illusion of their son's utter uniqueness because the big-mouthed, tiny-armed monster infant could mimic the gestures of The Itsy-Bitsy Pterodactyl. There was a similar outcry when we moved away from Outlook's suite-mates in the Microsoft Office dreadnaught. But whether it's familiarity, laziness or simple stubbornness dressed in a cloak of Ayn Randian Objectivism, the time has come to move on, commrade [sic...go deep in this pun, it is layered].
Using corp mail from the Y Mail web interface is remarkably feature rich. It supports booking conference rooms, folders, calendar, filters and global address book. Plus, you get built-in Messenger, smart conversation threading, powerful keyboard shortcuts, the new quick actions, attachment preview and our beautiful new rich themes. In the rare case you do need Outlook, like adding a delegate for your calendar, you can still fire up Outlook for 30 seconds.
But wait there's more. By using corporate Mail, you'll automatically get to dogfood our new features first. I'm especially excited about a new feature premiering in just a few more days: smart auto-suggest, powered by a platform from the still-have-that-new-acquisition-smell Xobni team. We have been testing this feature with select users in and out of the company and the response has been fantastic: "Whoa!", "Amazing", "Already in love with it. Woot!" and, my favorite, "So nicely integrated that it appears as if it's always been there. I already can't imagine it not being there again."
Feeling that little tingle? Take a deep breath, you can do this. We want you on board, sailor!
Please note, on the mobile side, corp mail is not yet supported in our Mail app for Android or iOS, but that will change (PB&J!). And, like all dogfood offerings, there is a feedback link in the product. Use it generously so we can make the improvements to make Yahoo Mail the unquestioned inbox champion of the world. I pitty [sic] the fool who resists.
Thanks for your support. It really does matter and we appreciate it.
Jeff Bonforte, SVP Communications Products
Randy Roumillat, CIO
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