[WAnderman]

GeoCities helped establish the successful paradigm of the online community and the value of its potential a decade+ before its time. The successful development of, investment in and the subsequent sale of Geo to Yahoo, provided a model for other innovative created and funded companies to work from.

One should trace where the various proceeds of this original sale actually went. Put into perspective: how did that ROI help original iinvestors fund other successful ventures? Ventures which have changed lives and bettered our world of technologically today; companies that find their roots in the benefits of the financial outcome of the original Geo Cities sale to Yahoo.

Fred Wilson, as an example, was a foundational pillar in the original GeoCities transaction. Many other successes followed for a visionary like him, built on the capital of that deal and the confidence it bred. A deal which yielded incalculable returns on the technology curve and both direct and indirect returns in the social capital it has empowered these folks to deliver to the world today. Eventually Twitter found original funding at the doors of Fred Wilson's Union Square Ventures. Quite the value chain in its own right.

It wasn't Yankee Stadium that built legends, it was great owners, coaches and teams. They in turn built legends within its walls seeding the entire world of baseball.

[WAnderman]

Duplication removed.

[JimH443]

I admit, I thought GeoCities died a long time ago. But it has served its purpose. It is where today's 6 figure web page designers first got their feet wet.

[chuckchuck]

Geocities was my learning ground - it was "free" and simple. It provided a lot of people with something we take for granted today - plenty of free web space. Geocities was a pioneer - you'll be missed, but recorded as an important stepping stone of the web's evolution.

[ImaPhake]

Let's not forget the invaluable service which GeoCities (with Tripod and Angelfire) provided for early users of WebTV!
WebTV did not initially provide its users with a way to build their own Web sites on the WebTV network. I'd dare to say WebTV users gave GeoCities a boost.

The oft-criticized WebTV sites on GeoCities were ugly in many ways -- mainly due to the fact that its users could only see them through the compressed screen real estate of WebTV itself -- computer users would usually be presented with a real mess when visiting those sites constructed through WebTV.

WebTV users were the butt of tremendous online abuse due to the garishness of their GeoCities Web sites -- computer users looked down their collective nose and treated them in much the same manner as AOL users were treated when that service finally allowed its userbase out into the wild -- Internet Lepers, so-to-speak (These days, MySpace sites make the garishness of a WebTV user-made site look positively scientific and high-tech in comparison).

At the same time, WebTV had many users who actually learned to hand-code HTML, javascript and the ins and outs of CGI. They created many online utilities on GeoCities sites for WebTV users -- things which would transfer files in and out of their WebTV emal accounsts for the purpose of Website construction. They made utilities for transferring an entire site from one domain to another, word processing utilites, graphics creation utilities, etc. If it was something they weren't given the capability of doing then they created it themselves.

Sites like GeoCities provided them with a tremendously easy way to circumvent WebTV's early limitations. There's hadly any need for sites like GeoCities today, but to their credit, they gave millions the opportunity to present a face to the world which wouldn't have been seen at all without them.

[mpheadley]

I am upset that I am learning about this through PC World first, rather than through yahoo itself. You see, I have had my business web site through yahoo geocities for a few years now. I am also upset that this ignorant author completely ignores or failed to find out about the very good drag and drop sitebuilder cloud software program that yahoo gave geocities. Maybe you should visit my site to see what you could actually do with a (then) 4.99 a month web site and a godaddy domain name (www.cutmymovie.com). I am proud of my web site considering I built it and continue to edit it solely myself without using HTML or any other web programming whatsoever using their software. However, last year they raised their price and previous customers were grandfathered at I think 7.99 a month and I started looking for something new. I have already started thinking about rebuilding my web site in adobe dreamweaver and subscribing to unlimited space and bandwidth and much more for only 8.99 a month. Yahoo let geocities die by many reasons. The biggest of which was trying to turn geocities into professional web hosting at a corporate price at the expense of its personal or small business clients. And of course they let it die by simply not offering their best, downloadable off-line software version of sitebuilder to everyone. On one hand, I'm sad to see it go and that I am now forced now to switch, and the other hand, hopefully microsoft or google might buy flickr, and then I won't have to deal with yahoo at all!

[mpheadley]

By the way, I found out the premium web hosting (which is really actually the best geocities option with a different brand name) reduced their price from a 11.99 monthly price to a 9.99 month price with actually a 4.99 a month for a year price.

But sorry yahoo, you've pissed off your years long geocities customers too much in recent years. Bye Bye!

[JBENZ]

It's a pity, really. Geocities is where I learned to write HTML. And where else could you post page after page of drivel about the Marx Brothers and get compliments on it?
I quit using it for anything but storage after Yahoo bought it and trashed it but it was fun while it lasted. Sorta like Netscape was before AOL...bought it and trashed it.

[k3v5h]

@Valethar. Lots of irony - when looking at this page I see 75% ads and fluff, 25% content. And the "content" is another one of these self-absorbed Twits desperately trying to be funny and falling far short. Most people have long forgotten about GeoCities, yes, but the same could be said for PCWorld.

[derekmoore333]

"first-generation Internet dorks (known then as "former SysOps")"

100% agreed with tomhanna. I don't think he understands what SysOps really did. Yes, they were first generation Internet, but they were also previous generation running BBS dial-in computer communications systems with hundreds or thousands of users in the 80's before the internet was cool or born and also using DARPA internet IP addresses before web pages existed.

Maybe he should write an article on dial-in technologies and dumb terminals which are still in use before he calls us dorks. RE-AFFIRMED - PC WORLD is for NEWBIES ;)

[oldschoolh4ck3r]

I miss the old Geocities, before Yahoo! grabbed it up and made it bland and boring. It was great being able to see a map of other neighborhood sites and click to see what you'd find. Sure, these weren't professionally-designed websites for the most part. But that didn't matter. There was more of a feeling of community before it was taken over and turned into a corporate cookie-cutter service. Social sites like Myspace have eliminated the need for sites like Geocities though. Most people don't want to have to learn HTML or use web-design wizards just to post some basic info and photos.
Geocities was a trend-setter and a true Internet legend. R.I.P.

[mpheadley]

Yeah, you're right. I realize now I was in the extreme minority for using geocities to design my own small business web site on geocities within the past few years. But I made my own personal wedding web site before that as well as my own personal web site for professional self-promotion before the wedding site, and a few personal sites before that. So it was kind of a progression for me.

So I think after yahoo took over it did suffer from an identity crisis. Before it was almost entirely social, and afterwards, yahoo wanted to turn it into a design your own professional or business web site service. And of course the latter must have never really took off, even though I stayed with them. But I'm still upset. Now I've gotta scramble to re-do my web site somewhere else, because I'm definitely not using yahoo webhosting (see my previous post). Although it is on their home page now that I just looked, I still have yet to receive even an email about this, which I feel angry about. I first learned about this here.

[OldOnliner]

Though I am in the process of moving/migrating files, intending to bring a new look to Stateline.net, it'd be nice if someone (at Yahoo!) had informed their PAYING CUSTOMERS (me!) of this milestone!

I checked today and Geocities FTP appears to be broken although the site and its accompanying control panel still show up just fine.

[ScooterC]

Excellent analogy.

As one of those Amateur "hacks" it was the only way to learn. Professional sites were no better.

My current, paid for, website would be categorized as "geocities bad", but it works! It brings in work.

The blog format is better for the business world, but doesn't do much for the wonderful imaginative presentations of what was possible in Geocities.

Good, is in the eye of the beholder. Yahoo DID buy an idea and as usual, think they know better.

BUT, new customers are out there and can't afford to play around with the new concept of web creation, for a fee.

Yahoo's reorganization away from the Geocities IDEA, is IMO, the wrong move.

But it won't be any different then Yahoo groups, which started out as free, and grew to huge, and then they added the "pro" version for a fee and better service (like not having their group totally wiped out, for no discernable reason?). Why would anyone pay for something that is free, even with risks.

Adelphi has a better free|paid system, but not as well known, therefor fewer "sites" for specific interests (free or Paid).

[mpheadley]

I've been meaning to get back to you about this but my internet connection has been crappy and I've been busy watching my kids the past couple days! Anyway, I use a freeware FTP utility program called FileZilla. It works great!

http://sourceforge.n...jects/filezilla

In the site manager, just put "ftp.geocities.com"in the box under "host" and "21" under "port" And then just your typical username and password.

[passepartout]

Lines on the death of GeoCities.com

So. Farewell
Then GeoCities.

Home of the
tag.

Your catchphrase
Was an
`Under Construction?
Animated GIF.

But you?re
Not so
Animated now.

E.J. Thribb (17.4 build82)

[nimd4]

@ least they were curteous enough 2 post a list of free web hosting sites: "I don't want to pay for a site. Can you recommend free services?"


:)

[SheldonArthouse]

I found GeoCities to be helpful because I am an artist who was not very good with html but was able to work with WYSIWYG, drag and paste. I used GeoCities to present an online gallery of my work. I find that the look of your site depends on your content and how you display it and how true you hold to your theme and maintain an interesting atmosphere for the viewer. Early on, I found that it was possible to mold your GeoCities site to look aesthetically pleasing. A lot of other more recent sites, tend to overuse flash, and other special effects just because they're available, to the point of "synapse blowout" where you are so distracted that you can't focus on what the site is supposed to really be about. Many also use a fancy "pre-page" which is more about showing off their digital acrobatics, than getting right to the point of their site and unfortunately inadvertently turned away potential viewers/clients who were just taking a quick browse at their office computer during work hours in between tasks and who did not have time to wait for the pre-page to load or even to press the "Skip this" button.

Any short comings in visuals that I might have had with my site, had my more to do with my limited understanding of how to manipulate what I cut and pasted on to it, than GeoCities itself. I was able however, with my site's humble but inviting look, to achieve my goal of letting the world view my art, actually make some sales, and add legitimacy to myself as an artist by having an internet presence (which matters today)...and all without learning code which I did not have the time to learn in between my illustrating. --Sheldon sheldonsarthouse.com

[mpheadley]

So it's been a week or two since Yahoo has sent out emails to those with the 5 or 8 dollar package a month web site, and possibly others. I have received two different emails with two different plans. One is I can continue having my website and upgrade to their web hosting with the offline pagebuilder for the same price I've been paying for five years. Then I get another email saying the same thing but at the original 4.99 a month fee for a year, and afterwards it goes up to the normal webhosting price of either 10 or like 12 bucks a month or something. Now why would I do that?!

This confusing package crap is why I am so angry with yahoo to begin with. I'm surely going to go with the five year plan for now until I have time to fully redevelop off-line with Adobe Dreamweaver and then transfer my web site, but I have no intentions with sticking with yahoo for the long run. And why would they send out two very different upgrade plans? I guess they are trying to please everyone. Instead it just further aggravates me!

Just wanted to know if everyone else who has posted here has received both emails, and what you thought of their plans.

Remember, you have only until October now to decide about any of this.

[godaddy]

Former GeoCities users: $1.99 domains at Go Daddy. Each domain comes with free hosting. Use code GEO199 at checkout. Offer ends 11/9.