Yahoo will no longer allow users to upload content to the Yahoo Groups site. Yahoo is saying that YahooGroups will continue to exist, but only has a message site – messages aren’t going away, but all attachments and everything in the collaboration areas are. Here is the Official Yahoo Announcement.

Beginning October 21, 2019 YahooGroups users won’t be able to upload any content to a YahooGroup except for messages, and as of December 14 all previously posted content on the site will be permanently removed. You’ll have until that date to save anything you’ve uploaded.

EVERYTHING but messages on YahooGroups is going away: 

• Files
• Polls
• Links
• Photos
• Folders
• Calendar
• Database
• Attachments
• Conversations
• Message Digest
• Message History

All Yahoo Groups site will be made private or restricted. Any new group members will need to request an invite or be invited by an admin.

You will still be able to communicate with YahooGroup members via email and search for private groups on the site and ask to join groups.

My advice, other than backing up the files on a YahooGroup you don’t want to lose: ABANDON SHIP. Find a new platform to communicate with your group! I do NOT recommend Facebook, since Facebook’s privacy is non-existent and not everyone is on Facebook (nor wishes to be forced on it just to be a member of your group).

I’m testing out groups.io. I’ve set up a group myself, to discuss nonprofit management. The free version is quite robust.

Just know that there is no magic third party messaging platform, file sharing platform, collaboration platform or blog platform that won’t, at some point, go away. Just as car brands come and go, just as technology comes and goes (remember cassette tapes?), online platforms come and go. All that talk you heard of the permanence of digital data, that nothing disappears from the Internet? Yeah, about that…