The Singapore Gay News List (SiGNeL)[1] was a Yahoo! Groups news list started on 15 March 1997 by pioneering gay activist and socio-political analyst Alex Au on behalf of People Like Us.
The date of its founding, the Ides of March, had a cryptic coincidental symbolism - an allegory to the slaying of Caesar.
Its subscribership grew to over 2000 by the mid-2000s and it represented the main platform for intellectual discussion of LGBT issues in Singapore. SiGNeL postings had been archived in Yahoo! Groups since 1999.
SiGNeL formed an invaluable repository of the evolving thoughts of LGBT activists and interested stakeholders, as well as a chronicle of the salient events in Singapore's LGBT history. Examples were the registration of People Like Us as a society, the organisation of IndigNation and the origin of Pink Dot.
It had been dormant since the mid-2010s.
Subsequent Singapore LGBT-related articles were uploaded by Roy Tan to SLEMA, the Singapore LGBT encyclopaedia media archive.
On 14 December 2019, in a move which caused a worldwide outcry, Yahoo! deleted all the information in Yahoo!Groups, including SiGNeL, thereby obliterating almost two decades of Singapore's archived LGBT history. Fortunately, Yahoo! provided an option for all members to download a consolidated archive of the posts to their computers before the deletion.
Notice of final shutdown of Yahoo! Groups[]
On 29 December 2020, the Yahoo! Groups team sent the following email to all its users:
"Dear Yahoo Group Moderators and Members,
We recently announced that groups.yahoo.com (Yahoo Groups) and its list service will shut down on December 15, 2020. We would like to clarify that there will be no changes to other Yahoo properties or services. For example, your Yahoo account will not change and there are no changes to Yahoo Mail.
The only change on December 15, 2020 is that you will no longer be able to visit the Yahoo Groups website at groups.yahoo.com or use its mailing list features.
We’ve updated our comprehensive FAQ here[2].
Thank you to everyone who reached out with questions or comments.
Sincerely,
The Yahoo Groups team
FAQ[]
Yahoo Groups to shut down on December 15, 2020
Yahoo has made the decision to shut down Yahoo Groups. To help you through this transition, we've compiled some frequently asked questions.
Will this impact my Yahoo Mail account?[]
No, the only thing being decommissioned is Yahoo Groups (groups.yahoo.com) and emails sent from Yahoo Groups. Yahoo Mail will continue to function normally.
Why was this decision made?[]
Yahoo Groups has made the decision to shut down as of December 15. Yahoo Groups has seen a steady decline in usage over the last several years. Over that same period, we've witnessed unprecedented levels of engagement across our properties as customers seek out premium, trustworthy content. While these decisions are never easy, we must sometimes make difficult decisions regarding products that no longer fit our long-term strategy as we hone our focus on other areas of the business.
What is the timeline for this process?[]
- October 12 - The creation of new groups will be disabled.
- December 15 - You'll no longer be able to send and receive emails from Yahoo Groups. The website will no longer be accessible.
What will happen to my emails with my group members after December 15?[]
Any existing messages in your email account won't be affected by this change. Messages that were on the Yahoo Groups site were already removed earlier this year. Beginning December 15, new messages will not be sent or received from your group members; if you try to email your group after December 15, your message will not be delivered and you will receive a failure notification.
How can I continue to connect with my group?[]
Although we do not have any official partnerships with any of the following groups' sites, we feel that the least we can do for our loyal customers is to recommend some reliable sites for our users to continue having group communications. These sites are simple and easy to use.
The site we recommend the most is Nextdoor, as it has a help page advising how to switch your Yahoo Groups to their site!
- Nextdoor - Use any email account to sign up
- Facebook Groups - Requires a Facebook account
- Google Groups - The admin of the group must have a Gmail account
- Groups.io - The paid version allows for importing members from Yahoo Groups
How do I get a list of my group members so I can communicate with them after Yahoo Groups ends?[]
Turn off pop-up blocker - The file will not be able to download unless you disable your pop-up blocker first.
Only admins will be able to invite group members to a new group using the following actions:
- Access your group's page.
- Click Management | Manage members.
- Click the Actions menu.
- Click Export.
[]
Send any comments or feedback you have regarding this decision to YahooGroupsEscalations@verizonmedia.com Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts with us."
See also[]
References[]
- SiGNeL on Yahoo! Groups:[3]
Acknowledgements[]
This article was written by Roy Tan.