And yes, this is a kvetching post unless someone's got a secret way to fix all of this.

I've had all sorts of problems with my Yahoo accounts, and so have avoided Yahoo services except for Flickr. Not sure why but it does seem to happen a lot. Sorry to hear about your mess.

a secret way to fix all of this

um, stop relying on Corporate Centralized ShinyWidgets™ to keep your stuff safe? saving and storing thousands of emails is what email clients are for. even my google mail ends up on my own hard disk! sheesh! buy some hosting or set up your own server and host your own homepage. i don't know what fantasy teams with paid add-ons even are, and i shudder to think, but it's truly a fantasy to think yahoo or any corporate service provider actually gives a shit about your data. if you give a shit about your data, keep your data safe yourself!

Totally helpful, as always, quonsar. Actually, amid your snark you did remind me that I do have a good portion of my account offline in my Thunderbird email client so you were actually helpful without intending to be. I bet that probably chafes you a bit.

And actually its not a pipedream to expect a company that I've purchased a product or service from to support that service. Its part of the purchase contract, you know? Reasonable expectations to access the service etcetera.

there's a bunch of hacker-for-hire sites that claim to be able to get your password back for about $50. Google "Hacking Yahoo Passwords" or something. Obviously this is a last resort.

I have personally been through this and let me give you my professional opinion: you are fucked. The entity playing you in the game pressed the reset button and you are abandoned and alone. Deal.

actually its not a pipedream to expect a company that I've purchased a product or service from to support that service
What year do you think this is, 1945?

My understanding of these situations is that you are about to find out how much Yahoo! really cares about you and/or your data.

Yahoo is on my shit list. I started using yahoo mail in roughly '99 after I graduated from school and no longer had a reliable email address. I continued using it on and off as a point of contact for friends who didn't keep up with where I was working etc.

Every now and then I thought, "I should really figure out a way to get that mail locally somehow" and even looked around for a way to do it, but didn't find anything reasonable.

Fast forward to this year. I've had a steady job for a couple of years, and pretty much everyone has my new address. I don't check my yahoo mail for a while. Then, a month or so ago I go to check my yahoo mail for something.

They have deleted my f!@$^$%$ing account. Their policy is after 4 months of inactivity, they delete your account. Many years of mail, gone. No recourse.

Well, funny thing. If you dig deep enough you can actually find a Customer Care number to call and, lo and behold, after a half hour of waiting and crappy elevator music, it was simple to get my password reset and the whole thing straightened out.

The support by email is terrible but if you can get a live one on the phone, things can get dealt with rather easily.

Anyone need Yahoo Customer Care? Call (408) 349-1572, don't bother with the help pages at Yahoo.

Lazlo, they deleted my other email account with Yahoo but keep teasing me with restart it offers. Bleh. I'm going to be downloading every last email, contact and bit of info I can tonight.

Yay! I'm glad for you, fenriq.

fenriq, i wasn't being snarky. i was stating fact. i'm not sure what planet yer living on, but these are the days of naive consumerbots being horked all over by the corporate leeches who suck thier blood with no compunction or consequence. your notions of reasonable behavior from theiving whoredogs are at best quaint. wake up and look around. this ain't a techno-capitalist paradise, and you ain't george jetson. there. THAT'S snark.