Yo was a social

mobile application A mobile application or app is a computer program or software application designed to run on a mobile device such as a phone, tablet, or watch. Mobile applications often stand in contrast to desktop applications which are designed to run on d ...

for

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

, Android, and formerly also

Windows Phone Windows Phone (WP) is a discontinued mobile operating system developed by Microsoft Mobile for smartphones as the replacement successor to Windows Mobile and Zune. Windows Phone featured a new user interface derived from the Metro design languag ...

. Initially, the application's only function was to send the user's friends the word " yo" as a text and audio notification, but was then updated to enable users to attach links and location to their "Yo"s.

History

''Yo'' was created by Israeli developer Or Arbel in eight hours at the request of Moshe Hogeg, CEO of Mobli, who asked Arbel to design a single-button app to send a notification to his assistant or wife. It was launched on

April Fools' Day April Fools' Day or April Fool's Day (rarely called All Fools' Day) is an annual custom on the 1st of April consisting of practical jokes, hoaxes, and pranks. Jokesters often expose their actions by shouting "April Fool " at the recipient. ...

2014 for Android and

, though initially rejected by

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for being too simple. The app was only shared with Mobli employees to start, however 20,000 people were using the app within the first month of release. The app was shared on the Product Hunt website, through which it exploded in popularity. Following a wide range of interest from investors, the app received US$1 million in investment, including from Hogeg himself. In July 2014 the app was also released for

. The app was valued at between $5 and $10 million in the same month and received a further $1.5 million in funding. Arbel stated interest in expanding the app to include more functionality, including a possible feature which could be used by bloggers to send their followers a "yo" with a link to the blog attached whenever they post an update; the feature has since been implemented. The app's first content update was released in August 2014, adding extra functionality to it, including the ability to send web links and

hashtag A hashtag is a metadata tag operator that is prefaced by the hash symbol, ''#''. On social media, hashtags are used on microblogging and photo-sharing services–especially Twitter and Tumblr–as a form of user-generated tagging that enable ...

s, and creating user profiles. On 20 June 2014, Isaiah Turner hacked the app, allowing him to retrieve any user's phone number and spam or spoof "yos" to any user. After the exploit was fixed, Arbel hired him to work for the company. In October of the same year, the app introduced functionality to enable users to send their location to other users. In June 2015, Yo released the second version of their app with a number of new features. The user interface was updated to allow users to send photos or their location within 1 swipe and a tap from the home screen. The new version also enabled users to collect their friends into groups so that they could "Yo" a number of people with 1 tap. In 2016 the ''Yo'' company shut down. Arbel and other employees had since moved on to other jobs, and Arbel described the app as running on "autopilot". Arbel opened a

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account to continue funding maintenance of the app in 2018.

Features

The app enables users to send individual notifications to other users, simply containing the word " Yo". Users can additionally send their location. ''Yo'' is an option for the

IFTTT IFTTT (, an acronym of Conditional (computer programming)#If–then(–else), if this, then that) is a private commercial company that runs services that allow a user to program a response to events in the world. IFTTT has partnerships with dif ...

service. The app has an API, which has enabled developers and brands to send a ''Yo'' to groups of users, such as when the

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the name is ...

sent a ''Yo'' every time a goal was scored.

FedEx FedEx Corporation, originally known as Federal Express Corporation, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate holding company specializing in Package delivery, transportation, e-commerce, and ...

set up a service using the app through which users could receive a ''Yo'' when their package was being delivered.

Reception

Since its release, ''Yo'' has been downloaded over 3 million times and by 2016 over 100 million 'Yo's had been sent. Joachim Fels, an economist at

Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in 42 countries and more than 80,000 employees, the firm's clients in ...

, expressed interest in the app due to its simplicity. At the height of its popularity the app reached the number 4 position on the

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and #1 in the social networking category.

Similar apps

A number of apps inspired by ''Yo'' have been released, including one which sends the word ' Hodor', and one which sends the Indian word 'aiyo'. The app has also been adapted to warn

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

i citizens of missile strikes. An app called ''Lo'' was partly inspired by ''Yo'', sending only a user's location. In July 2014 some of the copies and parodies received copyright complaints from ''Yo'', with Arbel saying "Yo has spawned many clones... some of them are a complete replication of the Yo app... Improving upon our concept is welcomed, copying us bit-by-bit isn't.". In August 2014, Tom Scott and Matt Gray created Emojli, an emoji only messenger app, partly inspired by the success of ''Yo''. For a subplot in season two of the HBO show "

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...

" HBO reportedly built a prototype of the featured ''Bro'' app, an app just like ''Yo'', "but less original".

References

External links

{{Nonverbal communication Android (operating system) software IOS software Windows Phone software Defunct social networking services Israeli social networking websites 2014 software