Yahoo Closes News Forums

Yahoo has pulled the plug temporarily on message boards that were linked to individual articles on the portal's news site.

In a posting to readers, Neil Budde, general manager for Yahoo News, said the online forums were taken down while the portal works on "new ways for readers to comment on the news and participate in a discussion around it."

"As they were set up, the Yahoo News message boards allowed a small number of vocal users to dominate the discussion," Budde said. "In addition, related discussions from similar news articles were not easily linked."

The portal expected to launch new discussion forums over the next few months. Yahoo officials were not immediately available for comment on Friday.

Yahoo in general is expected to make major changes to services as a result of a management shake-up and reorganization announced this month. It was the first overhaul in five years for the Internet company, which has fallen behind more agile competitors, such as Google, MySpace, and YouTube, in emerging, profitable markets.