Yahoo plans to turn its Web site into a social hub

Yahoo Inc plans to make its Web site a social hub by hosting applications from other online services, part of the Internet pioneer’s effort to spawn more advertising opportunities.

“We are going to rewire the entire experience at Yahoo to make it social in every dimension,” Yahoo chief technology officer Ari Balogh said on Thursday at a “Web 2.0” conference that drew a crowd of more than 1,000.

The more open platform copies a concept that already has been embraced by Internet search leader Google Inc and a variety of online social hangouts, including Facebook Inc and News Corp’s MySpace.com.

Yahoo’s new look will give its roughly 500 million users greater flexibility to customize Web pages. They will be able to pick from a variety of mini-applications, known as “widgets,” and plant them just about anywhere on the site, including their personal version of the front page.

Hoping to capitalize on the social networking craze, Yahoo also is making it easier to connect with friends and family through its Web site. For example, it will highlight messages from e-mail users’ most frequent connections let them track the activities and opinions of online buddies.

The makeover’s timing hasn’t been determined, but it will happen before the end of the year, Balogh said. It could still be derailed if Yahoo is taken over by Microsoft Corp, which has offered to buy its rival for more than US$44 billion.

Maintaining that Microsoft’s bid is insufficient, Yahoo has been implementing a long-promised turnaround strategy designed to boost revenue growth after more than two years of financial lethargy.

Management has promised the Sunnyvale-based company’s revenue will climb more than 20 percent next year and in 2010.

Empowering friends and family to track each other has raised privacy concerns at Facebook, but Balogh said Yahoo will take steps to ensure users retain control over their personal information.

This isn’t Yahoo’s first attempt to become a bigger player in the Internet’s social scene. The company launched a social network called “360” in 2005, but recently closed the service down because it never caught on.