Yahoo Answers shuts down May 4 with no plans to archive the website's 16 years of content.
Users will no longer be able to post questions or answers on the site beginning April 20 and, from there until May 4, it will be available in read-only mode. Users will be redirected to Yahoo's main page.
Yahoo Answers debuted in June 2005. Because of badly worded questions and responses, the forum became a source of amusing memes. Today, however, the website's front page is packed with conspiracy-fueled questions about George Floyd's death, Joe Biden's presidency and the Holocaust.
In the early days of the internet, Yahoo Answers and Yahoo, in general, were popular.
However, Google and its products such as Search and Gmail altered how people interacted with the internet. Nonetheless, the idea of platforms for public Q&As hasn't died. Sites such as Reddit and Quora continue to serve a similar role and have a wide user base.
Yahoo, which was purchased by Verizon Media Group in 2017 for approximately $5 billion, announced the change at the top of the Yahoo Answers homepage.
The message contains a link to a FAQs that explains the shutdown's timeline.
Users will have until June 30 to request their data after which it will be unavailable. This includes "all user-generated content, including questions, answers and images," according to Yahoo, but "you won't be able to download other users' content, questions or answers."
A note sent to active Yahoo Answers members explains it is being shut down because it "has become less popular over the years" and the company "decided to shift our resources away" from the product to "focus on products that better serve our members."
