Apps

#TBT: RIP, Yahoo. You had a good run

Published

July 28, 2016

Monch Lopez

News broke out on Monday that Verizon, one of the giants of the U.S. telecom industry, is acquiring Yahoo for a small fraction of what it was worth during the dot-com boom glory days. Reports said the agreement was worth five billion dollars in cash — which is a lot but still nowhere near Yahoo’s $125-billion valuation in 2000, when it had enough in the coffers to buy Google.

And although the deal has yet to be fully ironed out — it will be completed sometime in 2017 — the death knell has sounded, the fate of an internet pioneer has been decided, and it looks like its next chapter will involve mobile video.

Yahoo, as you and I know it, is no more, even if it retains its name.

(Time for a disclosure: I wrote tech stories for Yahoo Philippines. My partner worked as an editor for the company.)

This isn’t a eulogy for Yahoo; it has historically done well on the stock market. People far smarter than I am said its stock outperformed its contemporaries from a bygone era. Unfortunately, its accomplishments on Wall Street didn’t mean as much to the people in Silicon Valley and to the rest of the world.

We should’t shed a tear for the company, or its investors. We could instead take a nice, casual walk on memory lane.

My early exposure to the web started with Yahoo services: the Yahoo landing page was my Facebook News Feed; the email and chat clients were my Gmail and Messenger and Slack apps; Yahoo Music on the desktop messenger app was my Spotify; Yahoo Groups was my Reddit; and all my searches were done on the Yahoo homepage.

If I wanted to get things done online in the late ’90s, Yahoo was my first click. For the vast majority of the population, including myself, Yahoo wasn’t on the internet, it was the internet.

And I wasn’t alone; my brother, all my friends — we were on the same page. These were innocent times, before hackers and malware coders and trolls and cyberbullies and mean-spirited armchair critics.

I’d be lying to you if I said at that time I thought the status quo would never change, but it did irrevocably. My social circle stopped using Yahoo for anything except to tell the people around them to use Google or Friendster or Napster instead. Being the impressionable youth I was, I gave in and signed out.

Your story is probably different than mine. But the ending is nevertheless familiar: We signed out.

Over the next few months, pundits will argue why Yahoo’s empire crumbled; why Marissa Mayer, the ex-Google executive tasked to lead the company’s comeback efforts, couldn’t keep the roofs and pillars from collapsing; and what could have been done to stop the cracks from showing.

I share the sentiment that it didn’t pivot fast enough to take full advantage of the digital ad market, and that Yahoo couldn’t decide what it wanted to be, even as Google was attempting to usurp its dominance in search. Most damning of all is its failure to act on shifting consumer preferences, the shift from desktop to mobile computing and from websites to apps.

I still have two active Yahoo Mail accounts: There’s one I check less frequently than my Google inbox; the other, I couldn’t care less about — it’s probably full of spam, anyway. That’s about the extent of Yahoo’s influence on my life today, its role reduced to housing possibly malicious emails.

How times have changed.

[irp posts=”8688″ name=”16 biggest hits and misses of 2016″]

Apps

Disney+ launches a TikTok-coded vertical feed called Verts

Published

March 13, 2026

Luigi Leonardo

TikTok has changed how we consume media. Everything is now vertical. Even the most established streaming services, often a bastion for traditionally horizontal content, is adopting the different format. Now, Disney+ is getting a vertical feed called Verts.

Like its contemporaries, Verts presents a continuous feed of content but tailored to show the plethora of titles from the Disney+ library. This might include the first scenes of shows or notable highlights. The hope, of course, is to direct users to the longform content.

Directly from the Verts feed, users can easily add the respective title to their watchlist or go straight to the title’s page. In turn, the feed is accessible from the homepage since it has its own tab.

According to Disney, early experiments with the feature have driven engagement to available content. Right now, the feed is mostly for clipping enticing content from shows. However, the platform will experiment further with the format for new ways to tell stories.

Though Verts surely stands for “verticals” in this case, “adverts” might fit better as its full government name. Still, it might be a useful tool if you’re figuring out what to watch for the night.

Currently, Verts is available for Disney+ subscribers in the United States. Disney also has plans to expand the feature to ESPN for sports-related content.

Apps

Google Maps is finally getting a 3D mode

The app will also have a Gemini chatbot baked inside.

Published

March 13, 2026

Luigi Leonardo

Some of today’s navigation apps are living in the future. Instead of a two-dimensional map, these apps render the user’s surroundings in 3D. It’s a nifty upgrade that helps drivers more accurately visualize directions on the fly. Finally, Google Maps is getting a much-needed upgrade and will take navigation to the third dimension.

In a new update rolling out today, the new Immersive Navigation feature will bring your surroundings to life. The 3D view creates a render of the surrounding buildings, overpasses, and terrain around the car. It takes the guesswork out of navigation by showing precisely where to turn and what landmarks to look out for.

In the same vein, you can now use Street View to preview your destination before you arrive. Google Maps will also highlight your destination’s entrance, side of the street, and nearby parking.

Outside of how the map is visualized, Google Maps is also infusing its service with Gemini. The new Ask Maps feature will let you engage with the app in a conversational manner. For example, if you’re in the middle of a long drive, you can now ask Maps where the best place is to stop over and have a coffee break. Ask Maps will provide directions, a potential itinerary, and even helpful links to book a reservation ahead of time.

Now, availability for both of these features is still a bit limited. Immersive View is rolling out today to compatible devices and vehicles in the United States. Further, availability will expand over the coming months.

Meanwhile, Ask Maps is available now in the United States and India for Android and iOS. A desktop version is coming soon.

Apps

Apple Music, TikTok launch Play Full Song, a new music discovery experience

Rolling out worldwide exclusively through Apple Music

Published

March 12, 2026

GadgetMatch

Ever came across a viral 15 or 30-second music snippet on TikTok that instantly became your jam on repeat?

For years, TikTok has been a regular source of songs that have become part of our playlists. And together with Apple Music, listening to the music you discover has just gotten even easier.

That’s through Play Full Song, a new music discovery experience, which launches exclusively though Apple Music.

With the new feature, Apple Music subscribers can now enjoy full-length tracks that they discover on TikTok. That’s without ever leaving that popular streaming app.

Fans who discover a song that they love on their For You or Sound Detail page can simply tap the Play Full Song button to open up an Apple Music player and enjoy the song in its entirety.

From there, subscribers can continue listening to a personalized stream of recommended songs. That means no more need to switch apps and search separately.

The new Play Full Song experience helps music fans move seamlessly from the moment of discovery to deeper listening. It’s also designed to be instant and all within the same environment.

Moreover, users can also save their favorite songs to Your Music and add them directly to their Apple Music playlists.

Built using Apple’s MusicKit, full-length song playback takes place on Apple Music. This way, streams are paid within the Apple Music service, supporting artists and rights holders while giving fans a smooth, uninterrupted experience.

Listening Party also launched

The feature builds on the success of TikTok’s Add to Music App. This was previously launched to help artists and fans convert discovery on TikTok to a playlist save in Apple Music and other streaming services.

To cap the announcement, TikTok and Apple Music are also introducing Listening Party. This new feature is designed to bring artists and fans together around music.

It creates a shared environment where fans can listen to songs from their favorite artists in real time, interact with each her, and engage directly with the artist during the session.