Xoopit + Yahoo! Mail = Moving beyond that massive digital shoebox

Posted July 22nd, 2009 at 5:29 pm by Bryan Lamkin, Yahoo! Applications

 35 Comments / Filed in: Trends & News

If your email inbox is anything like mine, it’s turned into a “digital shoebox” over the years. It’s full of hundreds or maybe thousands of special photos that have been shared by close friends and family members, but they’re not organized in any particular way. I open them, occasionally print or forward them, and then move on to my mail, letting precious pictures become buried in the unlimited storage of my inbox.

Enter Xoopit, which Yahoo! signed an agreement to acquire today. Their name may sound familiar – they won our Open Hack Day last fall and we teamed with them in December to launch the “My Photos” app in Yahoo! Mail, which many of you are already using today. In fact, it’s the most popular third party app in Yahoo! Mail.

With the integration of Xoopit’s platform technology and capabilities, the task of sending photos via email will be as easy as it should be and sharing photo albums with friends and family members will also be a cinch. You’ll be able to share your pictures among a group of friends or family like never before – combining pictures from numerous sources into a single album for a private group to view. And soon your inbox will become an organized photo index as well. Just imagine having a tool that collects all the photos you’ve sent and received over the years into that scrapbook you’ve never had time to assemble.

In short, Xoopit will bring phenomenal photo organization, improved photo sharing, and the serendipity of discovering forgotten photos to Yahoo! Mail.

Why is this such a big deal? Yahoo! Mail is actually home to one of the largest online photo repositories in the world. And every day, millions of you use Yahoo! Mail as your primary way to share the photos of important moments in your lives. While social networks and community sites are great for sharing photos with everyone you know, we realize it’s not for everyone or every occasion. For many, email is still best for sharing photos among a more select group of friends or family. And now we’re making it all that much easier for you.

For a flavor of what’s to come, take a look at this quick demo of how Xoopit currently works in Yahoo! Mail’s “My Photos” app.

BTW: I know what you’re thinking. In comes the guy who oversaw Photoshop for 13 years and all he can think about is photos? Well, rest assured a smart team was thinking about solving this problem well before I showed up on Yahoo!’s doorstep. And it’s just one of the many things on our plate to ensure we’re improving our products!

Please join me in welcoming the talented Xoopit team to the Yahoo! family. We can’t wait to help you tap your inbox for all those great photos waiting to be rediscovered.

Bryan Lamkin
SVP Yahoo! Applications

PS: For you Gmail+Xoopit users out there who’ve been waiting for an excuse to switch to Yahoo!, here’s your chance. But, in the meantime, we will still be providing support for your Xoopit Firefox Add-on.

Tagged: acquisition, news, xoopit, yahoo! mail

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35 Comments Add your own

Robin Capper | July 22nd, 2009 at 10:20 pm

What does this mean, if anything, for Flickr?

Alejandro | July 23rd, 2009 at 1:48 am

Great idea! By the way, what is the name of the MP3 playing in the background of the demo.

Thanks,

Alejandro

KAZRAJ AHAMED | July 23rd, 2009 at 6:37 am

Yahoo is what yahoo says………..
Wow..Excellant

Dahnay | July 23rd, 2009 at 7:56 am

Looks Great , but , Only work in Firefox like a Addd On ?

Steve Spengler (analyst) | July 23rd, 2009 at 9:45 am

So YHOO paid $20m for a plugin for a browser that’s not even dominant in the market? And you guys are going through layoffs again?

I’m sorry but this deal makes no sense whatsoever.

Eyal | July 23rd, 2009 at 10:34 am

Anyone can have this feature, even in gmail, with no plugin.
Try http://www.2pad.com

Goldie | July 23rd, 2009 at 12:43 pm

Soooo …….. why do I not have it???
Is this for “special” people?

Bryan Lamkin | July 23rd, 2009 at 4:59 pm

Thanks for the comments, everyone.

@Robin Capper: We see Xoopit’s photo and media sharing and indexing technologies as complementary to Flickr.

@Goldie: The My Photos app from Xoopit (shown in the video) is an application available to Yahoo! Mail users as of last night. If you don’t already have apps enabled in Yahoo! Mail, you can sign up here http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/applications

@Steve Spengler, @Dahnay: Xoopit is much more than a browser plug-in! Xoopit provides mail-specific photo sharing platform technology beyond Yahoo! Mail’s current capabilities. Their technology lets us bring differentiated features to you, like powerful indexing and enhanced photosharing.

Nicki Dugan | July 23rd, 2009 at 5:04 pm

And @Alejandro, the song was composed and performed by a friend of Xoopit’s CEO. We’re looking into whether the song is available online somewhere.

Matias | July 23rd, 2009 at 9:30 pm

REALLY COOOOLLL!!!!

but… please tell us the name of the song!!

haha greathings!!

Kate | July 24th, 2009 at 6:07 am

I don’t have any “My Photos” app. on ATT-Yahoo. What are we talking about?

Diana Smith | July 24th, 2009 at 8:17 am

The link listed above to setup the applications feature for our email does not seem to work. It takes me to a window that says that link does not exist. Is there another link I can use?
Thanks!

Debbie | July 25th, 2009 at 10:17 am

I used to have all of my photos in yahoo, and then you discontinued it. I had to take the time to transfer everything to shutterfly. So why should I take a chance on yahoo again?

Alejandro | July 25th, 2009 at 3:58 pm

Thanks Nicki! Really cool song! Let me know where we can play it!

Great job!

Gerald Massimei | July 26th, 2009 at 3:15 pm

When I clicked the link sent to me about Xoopit and the link here http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/applications I get the error message seen at the bottom. So what is the correct link?
*********************************************************
Sorry, the page you requested was not found.

Please check the URL for proper spelling and capitalization. If you’re having trouble locating a destination on Yahoo!, try visiting the Yahoo! home page or look through a list of Yahoo!’s online services. Also, you may find what you’re looking for if you try searching below.

johnb | July 28th, 2009 at 6:48 am

The idea is great. In fact, I was already poised to give up my picasa account, until I tried to use xoopit in yahoo mail for sometimes. I found out that it’s not YET a worthy replacement of my picasa.
Photos could not be organized as you want it. They are stuck where they are.
Give us more control of our pictures. Please, make xoopit more usable. I love the idea of staying at yahoo mail all the time. But give us more reasons to stay.

Nicki Dugan | July 28th, 2009 at 7:31 pm

@Kate: Any AT&T user can sign up to access these apps by visiting http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/applications.

@Diana Smith: I’m checking to see if there might be browser issues with that link. It works for most people!

Sean | August 3rd, 2009 at 9:56 am

How can I sign up for this service? It’s not accepting new user.

Also wondering if I allow Xoopit to have access to my emails, will the information stored on Xoopit server or Yahoo server?

nu_ryo | August 4th, 2009 at 10:05 am

I sign up at http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/applications.

But when I see in my yahoo mail account there are nothing. Or I must wait. If it like that, how long that I must wait?

Thank you.

Crazyhorse | August 5th, 2009 at 12:29 am

This is maybe how Yahoo! improves their services by acquiring other companies and services.Merging of services is one of the keys in success to keep on doing good business. Alhough I am not familiar with Xoopit, I will try to check this thing out if I can enjoy the new applications with my Yahoo!
I hope anybody can provide more info about Xoopit. How it derives its name and how Yahoo! acquired it? I am curious if Xoopit has services for Yahoo!’s competitors, can still Xoopit available with them as well after the acquisition?
I have searched Xoopit over the internet and while reading some info about it I have noticed about Inbox2.0. Anybody could discuss about Inbox2.0 as well?

connie | August 5th, 2009 at 7:23 pm

i want this for my mail

Cathy Gould | August 6th, 2009 at 12:07 am

Same problem- link does not connect. I’ve tried several times from four different links on four different pages.

I’m interested AND frustrated- a familiar state when I TRY to explore New Yahoo.

Ok, went on a rant here- deleted it.

Jim Gregory | August 10th, 2009 at 4:17 pm

If I allow Xoopit access to all my emails, where will the information be stored – AND what about privacy issues?

HID Kit | August 22nd, 2009 at 4:49 am

Nice topic.The link listed above to setup the applications feature for our email does not seem to work. It takes me to a window that says that link does not exist. Is there another link I can use?

Sara | August 25th, 2009 at 12:18 am

try registering here:

http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/apps

Jason | September 2nd, 2009 at 6:24 am

When i tried to use the service through Yahoo! Mail, i got a warning message saying “Any email or other information you provide the My Photos application can be used and stored by Xoopit Inc.”

Call me paranoid, but the extent of their usage of my e-mails and other attached files is seriously unclear, and Xoopit also says they may later store other contents to help introduce “new services”.

Isn’t this all too suspicious? Why does Yahoo pay so much for an unknown company, for a simple task of indexing attached photos (and all other attahed files). Is it so difficult for Yahoo to build a tool to search through our e-mail (which is already in their servers) and save us from sharing our private information with anyone else. Why am i asked to let them use my material, when Yahoo could have easily provided me with that service..?

kurtis | October 2nd, 2009 at 10:17 am

When i tried to use the service through Yahoo! Mail, i got a warning message saying “Any email or other information you provide the My Photos application can be used and stored by Xoopit Inc.”

Call me paranoid, but the extent of their usage of my e-mails and other attached files is seriously unclear, and Xoopit also says they may later store other contents to help introduce “new services”.

Isn’t this all too suspicious? Why does Yahoo pay so much for an unknown company, for a simple task of indexing attached photos (and all other attahed files). Is it so difficult for Yahoo to build a tool to search through our e-mail (which is already in their servers) and save us from sharing our private information with anyone else. Why am i asked to let them use my material, when Yahoo could have easily provided me with that service..?

Michael | October 2nd, 2009 at 1:12 pm

Why would anyone using GMail be “looking for an excuse” to switch to Yahoo? Gmail is better.

Rachel | October 7th, 2009 at 10:38 am

It’s still unclear to me if there is, and how much the fee is for this app. Does anyone else know?

Xenon HID | October 12th, 2009 at 9:02 pm

Excellent work every buddy can get lots of interesting information, keep on posting this type of brilliant articles.

maira rivera | November 20th, 2009 at 8:27 am

My family

AT | January 15th, 2010 at 8:00 am

I have both Mozilla Firefox and the latest version of Internet Explorer 8 (NOT Vista)
Bing as the home page and (free) Yahoo as the home page

The Flickr application and MyPhotos application BOTH work great with everything.
As well as being very easy to switch back and forth between MyPhotos or Flickr to view different photos
and being able to drag photos or just select photos into e-mail Is very simple.
Keep up the hard work to make sharing photos…easy!
Any future plans to link this up to facebook?

thank you!

Mike | January 24th, 2010 at 4:46 am

Does Xoopit keep the original versions of the images I uploaded? As in not the ones in my emails that My Photos dug up. The ones I really uploaded to Xoopit. Does it?

armando | May 12th, 2010 at 8:59 pm

thank you for keep up the hard work .

Hollywood Wallpapers | September 1st, 2010 at 10:36 am

thanks! send more post to keep us update, i like this blog.