Yahoo Groups Shutting Down - Dec 14, 2019 (UPDATED)

[morgandawn]

(Updated Oct 25, 2019)

Starting Oct 28, 2019 no new files (photos, documents, etc) will be allowed to be uploaded. Starting Dec 14, 2019, Yahoo Groups will be limited to emails only - functions like digest will be eliminated and all files and photos will be deleted. Admins will have limited tools and all groups will be invite only. And archives of existing messages will not longer be accessible.

What To Do?

I have a step by step guide here. The short version

1. Admins - back up your Groups and decide whether and where to move
2. Members - back up your Groups - don't leave this to the admins.
3. Everyone - consider documenting Yahoo Groups on Fanlore, help spread the word

The OTW has made an announcement. Their Open Doors preservation program is open to  providing storage of Yahoo Groups backups that are assembled by moderators and non-moderators alike. Details here.

Fans are gathering on a Discord Channel to chat and ask for and give help:  https://discord.gg/ek2xFyJ (updated invite)

Please follow the Yahoo Group Rescue Tumblr for updates

 

Comments

[duskpeterson]

First of all, this should help a lot in tracking down fandom lists at Yahoo Groups:

Fan Email Lists.

It's a site put together by alice ttlg, listing all the known fandom e-mail lists in the early 00s. This Internet Archive cache shows the site as of December 11, 2003. (To find the lists of Yahoo Groups, skip down to Yahoogroups.) The site lists 1,080 fandom groups at Yahoo Groups. (Edited to add: The Yahoogroups listings appear to have left out the multifandom groups at Yahoo Groups - those are a few hundred more groups.) In each case, the site includes the list URL, associated website, fandom, genre/type, and description.

After that point in Internet Archive's cache record, the site switched to an "Advanced Search" system for the full list, which no longer works, but you can still see later e-mail lists by clicking on "Last 30 Days: Any Genre."

Not all of the lists still exist, of course.

I made intensive use of this site in the early 00s, and my recollection is that it rarely missed noting a fandom list. (Alice is still around, by the way. You can find her contact information here, under "Contact the Populli Webmaster.")

I just went through the list of twenty fandom groups that I still belong to. Of those twenty, only one (Master & Apprentice) has anyone posting about the shutdown. I sent posts to the other nineteen, but I'm deeply concerned that the archives of major lists will be lost. For example, nothing had been posted (till I posted) at two of the largest multifandom slash lists: Allslash (614 members) and RareSlash (1294 members). Heaven only knows what other major lists are out there, not to mention quirky little lists that should be preserved.

What I'm thinking is that we (by which I mean, a group of sizeable volunteers) could go about this in a systematic manner, contacting all of the moderators of fandom lists, since their Yahoo Groups emails are on the list pages. Then we could make an attempt to save any lists whose mods weren't responding, but whose lists seemed worth saving.

Is this idea worth pursuing, do you think? Or is OTW already doing this? :)

[morgandawn]

Great list. Where are the moderator emails? Are you talking about the subscribe emails?

[morgandawn]

wacky idea: pull the emails with a data scraper,fire off a generic email to all list owners.

[duskpeterson]

You're wicked. :) But it might be justified in an emergency like this. I certainly didn't worry about spamming the lists when I sent out my warning notices.

[duskpeterson]

Though one thing to consider is that Yahoo Groups probably has measures to prevent mass mailings like that. I know that, back in the day, there was a limit to how many lists you could cc. So, for example, if you wanted to send a fic to eight lists, you had to do it in two emails, or you'd trigger the anti-spam catcher at Yahoo Groups.

[morgandawn]

where is the best place to look for the most complete list? I went to

SORTED BY LIST SERVICE
(sorted by fandom within each service)
Yahoogroups


A B C D E F G H I J K L M N

O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z 0-9

[duskpeterson]

That's the category I was looking at too, but it appears (at a quick glance) to have left out the multifandom lists at Yahoo Groups. The multifandom lists at all services are listed toward the top of the page. So together, those two categories should theoretically cover all the Yahoo Groups.

[morgandawn]

I agree - and it left off the RPS groups as well.

[duskpeterson]

Ah - thanks for catching that.

[duskpeterson]

No, there's also a Yahoo Groups email address that sends emails directly to whoever owns the list. Clickable versions are on each Group home page (near the subscribe email address), or you can just add the list name, like this: [listname]-owner@yahoogroups.com

Here's what it looks like on one of my lists:

hierarchicalfic-owner@yahoogroups.com

[morgandawn]

are you on slack? We're coordinating there

[duskpeterson]

I am indeed. Where do I go?

[morgandawn]

pm me your slack handle