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Criticized for missing the social media explosion, Yahoo plans to leverage its social properties, such as Flickr and Del.icio.us, on behalf of advertisers in the hopes of partnering with "passion brands" to generate more ad revenue.

In the coming months, Yahoo will begin rolling out the first set of what it calls "brand universes" - dedicated areas on Yahoo for fans of a movie or product to congregate, share and connect with each other, reports Adweek. Unlike the brand areas on MySpace and YouTube, Yahoo is not asking marketers for ad dollars to build the sites. Instead, it itself has identified a batch of 100 "passion brands" to build dedicated areas for.

In its first such area, Yahoo developed a destination for fans of Nintendo's Wii gaming system, wii.yahoo.com, which includes uploaded Flickr photos, information from Yahoo Answers, user-contributed links from Del.icio.us and videos from Yahoo's video-sharing service.

The brand universes are Yahoo's answer to the popularity of advertiser outposts on hot social media sites like MySpace and YouTube. On MySpace, advertisers have flocked to build profile pages to connect with consumers, while YouTube is leaning on "brand channels" to attract in users.
 
For entertainment properties, such brand hubs can help solve a vexing marketing problem: How to keep fan interest along the continuum of revenue opportunities, like the lulls between a film's theatrical run, game debut and DVD release.