Op-Ed: Yahoo finally loses the match, brings back Iran to signup country list

After 10 months of battle and quarrel, the Yahoo mail governors were finally convinced to reinstate the name of Iran to their list of countries.

It occurred in November 2007 when the Yahoo governors attempted to remove the name of Iran from their supporting countries in signup page lists using the pretext that US imposed some sanctions on the country. While it was already announced officially that the US exports to Iran has became tenfold despite of the sanctions during the incumbency period of George Bush as Americans president, Yahoo's state-funded website removed the name of Iran from its signup available countries list and banned the Iranian users from creating new accounts. Many journalists and experts believe that the issue of Iran sanctions is media propaganda rather than being practical while the 2008 statistics show that Iran is currently the largest economic partner of France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Portugal and Australia in the Persian Gulf region and also the fourth largest economic ally of Netherlands, Denmark and UK in Asia following S. Korea, China and Japan.

ISNA News Agency

A symbol of Persian dignity and power

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Anyhow, after the removal of Iran’s name, waves of protest swept through Iran and also among the Iranians residing in other countries. The first step was debuting a Google Bomb called “Hello Yahoo mail” with the aim of introducing Iran to global opinions, internet users and Yahoo directors as well. A young Iranian cyber activist Mohammad Tavakoli established the “helloyahoomail.net” with the slogan: “Culture is our weapon, the weak impose sanctions!” calling for the international attention toward the 7500 years old history of Persian culture and civilization. The main goal of this Google Bomb which objected the “Yahoo mail” keyword was to provide the users searching “Yahoo mail” in search engines with some unbiased and realistic information on Iran and its people, culture, arts, sciences and history so as to express that Yahoo is altercating with an ancient and peacemaking nation. The website interviewed many outstanding personalities including university professors and political figures regarding the issue and all condemned Yahoo. “Hello Yahoo mail” also commenced a national movement in order to encourage the existing Yahoo Iranian users to remove their accounts from the site. It is estimated that 5 million of Yahoo Iranian users removed their accounts from the Yahoo database after this national call and this inflicted huge damage to the international credit of Yahoo. Anyhow, Yahoo mail has suddenly re-included the name of Iran into its list of countries three days ago, without any announcement or apologizes. It is not clear that why Yahoo removed the name of Iran unexpectedly and why it added it again, but it is clear that “Hello Yahoo mail” was a simple reflection of Persian talent and power. The cyber influence of Iranian bloggers, journalists and activists lead to the unforgettable failure for Yahoo and proved that hostility, atrocity and animosity are not proper ways for dealing with ancient nations and civilizations.