Microsoft unveils unsolicited $44.6 billion takeover bid of Yahoo

[MacGuffin]

Microsoft bids $45 billion for Yahoo (http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/01/technology/microsoft_yahoo/?postversion=2008020113)

Good?

Bad?

Indifferent?

Will this balance out Google? I'm sure the govt. will be verrrry interested.

[Domino]

You had something to do with this. Didn't you, Ronin Attorney!

[MacGuffin]

You had something to do with this. Didn't you, Ronin Attorney!
No, but I may in the future.

[Karl]

How does this affect me? Is it going to affect how much my information is tracked? The quality of the search? Anything?

Really, yahoo and google should just merge, and then hire hackers to break up any new and/or rising search engines.

[Domino]

No, but I may in the future.

*short laugh* Touche.

[Oso Mocoso]

Indifferent?

Will this balance out Google? I'm sure the govt. will be verrrry interested.

Mostly I'm indifferent. Yahoo! would add substantially to Microsoft's ability to be evil. I don't think it's a move likely to lead to them getting a monopoly on search, but currently they do seem to be falling behind Google in the marketplace. Also, I believe that the software market will move in the direction of RIAs over the next few years, and that's an area where Google is well positioned to be a serious competitor to Microsoft. They don't want to get left behind.

[Rhu]

From an Internet junkie perspective: blah.

A Yahoo! with MS financial backing is less likely to innovate and more likely to attempt to become a clone of Google's present and roadmapped services, just with a few proprietary tweaks.

Ooh. Animated, transluscent hyperlinks on an ad-supported browser-only version of MS Word. Huzzah.

[Domino]

Yahoo! would add substantially to Microsoft's ability to be evil.

Well, their motto was never "Don't Be Evil". :D So why not! ;)

I read the business paper most every day and with Yahoo's lay-offs, they'll have to be overtaken if they want to survive Google.

[C.J.Woolf]

You had something to do with this. Didn't you, Ronin Attorney!

No, but I may in the future.
Perhaps we'll all be working for Microsoft someday -- or against it.

[Domino]

I hate to say it, but C.J. Woolf has a cunning plan.

[Limey]

Microsoft are trying to block adoption of Google as our new overlords.

Now if Google would buy up all of the "black fiber" under the ground (more fiber optic cable was laid than we needed since we figured out how to multiplex light by colors in the spectrum, effectively multiplying the throughput of each strand overnight).

I'd like to see Google expand into media or even telecoms. Maybe major cities can have a subscription to ultra high speed googlenet TV and ISP with a googlenet home device (cablemodem and MPEG-4 decoder combo)

I think that despite the Google fall in profits, this move is more defensive on MS' part. Yahoo has been fading and losing market share for years and I'm surprised at the $44B price tag considering that.

Yahoo should take the money.

[nittanylion302]

I read the business paper most every day and with Yahoo's lay-offs, they'll have to be overtaken if they want to survive Google.

According to alexa, yahoo actually has more hits than google.

[Limey]

According to alexa, yahoo actually has more hits than google.

I find their search engine to be more relevant. Google went downhill when adwords came out.

I used to subscribe to adwords for my wife's business. They kicked me out of the ranking on keywords when I canceled the adwords account, yet we're top returned search result on the two specific keywords on yahoo and most other engines.

[pangolin]

MSN Blows, and makes everything it touches blow. I used to use hotmail, then MSN took it over and it was still ok for a while, but now it blows.

This post brought to you by the letter B.

[Shoot!]

From an Internet junkie perspective: blah.

A Yahoo! with MS financial backing is less likely to innovate and more likely to attempt to become a clone of Google's present and roadmapped services, just with a few proprietary tweaks.

Indeed.