Yahoo recently launched it’s branded Widget Badges. Yahoo’s version of widgets is basically a dumbed down version of Google’s Desktop Widgets, except much crappier and harder to develop for.
The company stamped on a pretty “web 2.0″ template onto a bunch of widgets which turn out to be troublesome for an average user. They make you download a specific program for your desktop in order to run them which is a clunky 12mb. Of course, if you run anything older than the latest SP package of XP or Vista, you’re out of luck all together. Once you run the program, it spits out a bunch of defaults which are completely ridiculous. How many people check stocks directly on their desktop?
If you are a developer, you’ll be unhappy to hear that you must download a script program called Konfabulator specifically for Yahoo Widgets to create anything.
If it wasn’t for the 2.0 feel or the brand, this would fall flat on its face. Good thing Yahoo has a lot of money for future purposes.
Written: Sep 19, 2007
Tags: badgets, review, widgets, yahoo
Chris Coyier
September 20, 2007 @ 1:47 pm
Between Apple, Amazon, and now Yahoo, the big tech companies are going widget-crazy lately.
Gary Hess
September 20, 2007 @ 4:01 pm
Yeah, it’s a way to expand their brand… nothing really wrong with it. I just wish that Yahoo would do something new instead of following the pack. This project is just about one of the worst they have done. I simply loath it.