???? – 2002retired
Captain (videotex)
“Sent kanji as pictures when keyboards could not, and never quite found its audience.”
“No seller fees, no fuss, no survivors outside Taiwan and Japan. Rest easy, old rival of eBay.”
Launched in 1998 to go toe-to-toe with eBay, Yahoo! Auctions won hearts the old-fashioned way: it charged sellers nothing, making its money from advertising instead. In Singapore especially, fans stayed loyal even after rivals arrived, put off by eBay's high fees and cluttered pages.
The end came slowly, territory by territory — the UK and Ireland closed in 2002, with Yahoo! even nominating eBay as its 'preferred' replacement (a farewell few took personally), followed by the US and Canada in 2007, Singapore in 2008, and Hong Kong in 2020. When Japan blocked EEA and UK access in 2022, the door closed on most of the old world. What's left: Taiwan and Japan, keeping the free-listing faith.
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“Sent kanji as pictures when keyboards could not, and never quite found its audience.”
“It taught the world to point and click, then stepped aside with its trash can emptied.”
“Online gaming's awkward first draft, three years before anyone was ready.”