Microsoft Looks To Refuel Talks With Yahoo 188
froggero1 writes "The New York Post is reporting that Microsoft wants to rekindle the takeover talks with Yahoo. According to the article, Yahoo! has repeatability turned away their offers, but Microsoft hopes that a lucrative 50 billion dollar offer will bring them back to the table. This move would increase Microsoft's web search market share to roughly 38%."
Of couse (Score:5, Insightful)
Too easy? (Score:2, Insightful)
So which is it, 27 or 38 percent? (Score:4, Insightful)
As it stands now, a deal between Microsoft and Yahoo! would up the combined companies' share of the all-important search advertising market to 27 percent against Google's 65 percent.
I figure that it would be around 30% either way and falling.
Increase share? (Score:5, Insightful)
Bang goes MSFT's cash reserve (Score:2, Insightful)
A handful of deals like this, and the money will be gone. Then it's back to actually doing good business, something Microsoft seems awfully bad at these last years.
If Microsoft do buy Yahoo, it screams "duopoly", but in the long term they will ruin Yahoo's business, and leave the market entirely to Google.
Too much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft needs to let Yahoo alone and realize that it's not possible to do everything.
Re:Increase share? (Score:1, Insightful)
Sure they will, people reasoning like you are rare and few on the whole, but I know, you can get a different perspective if you spend most of your time here on slashdot.
That would be great... (Score:4, Insightful)
... cause then Microsloth would be one step closer to wiping out web standards and all the good work Yahoo! has put into the web development community.
Buy your way to the top!
No greater an illusion.
Like buying your search ranking or myspace friends.
Yahoo! Must Be Proud (Score:1, Insightful)
- "Fucking kill." (default)
- Fucking exploit.
Going from the former to the latter category is quite the feat! Yahoo! must be proud.Re:Bang goes MSFT's cash reserve (Score:4, Insightful)
I use google, they are my homepage, I pretty much do ALL of my searches on google, but do I want them to destroy Yahoo and be the only major player in the market? NOPE!
"Don't be evil" goes out the window quickly when you have all the power.
If there is no one to compete against, then there is no reason for innovation. They spend that energy they would have spent on search would move elsewhere to try to become Google$
Well- Yahoo would have to talk (Score:4, Insightful)
On one side I don't see this being more than a chat to work out a deal- to buy Yahoo would cost MS all of their cash reserves, and then there is the little problem of moving their technology base from *unix to Windows would be a multiyear screw up, er, project (how long did it take MS to move Hotmail over to Windows?).
On the other side- MS does need to move against Google in some meaningful manner- Google's judo flip and really put MS off balance in a way that will play out for years to come- and I doubt MS shareholders are happy with the flat stock price for the last 7 years.
I suggest a large bowl of popcorn while we wait this one out, with extra butter.
this should not be allowed (Score:5, Insightful)
Now they want to use a portion of their accumulated monopoly profits to acquire a company that has huge on-line communities and brand names. Anyone who's paid attention over the last 15-20 years knows what will come next: "best" access will soon be restricted to those who use Microsoft's operating system, browser, media players, and development tools. Eventually those using other browsers and operating systems may be shut out altogether. The average person buys Windows preinstalled on their Dell or Gateway won't care, but they don't see how innovation is being shut down the same way innovation in the PC desktop software market fell dramatically after Microsoft established its hegemony with Windows 95.
Microsoft has all the money and resources in the world. Let's see them build their own online communities, really innovate instead of talking about innovation.
Re:Bang goes MSFT's cash reserve (Score:3, Insightful)
Heh (Score:5, Insightful)
If Microsoft were running the show, I'm worried that would change. Plus, I think there would be other problems. For Microsoft, what would be the easiest and quickest way for them to completely demoralize the employees who work in their Internet divisions? Buy Yahoo. For Yahoo, what would be the easiest and quickest way to confuse and worry their employees? Sell to Microsoft (although many might not be that confused while they're swimming in their huge piles of money.)
Finally, I'm concerned about Yahoo's services, were Microsoft to purchase them. It sounds like Microsoft has a large number of middle managers and policy makers who like nothing more than to assert their authority with arbitrary decisions. Yahoo seems to value a fair amount of development and language agnosticism (with sites written in PHP, custom languages, etc...) What happens to these sites when Microsoft comes in? "I'm sorry - we're rebuilding that in
I don't know - my responses aren't typically those of the knee-jerk Slashdot mentality, but this makes me even me wince.
indeed this says a lot (Score:4, Insightful)
This is no less then an admission that their own search and online advertising strategy has failed completelly. They may disagree, but coin like that being offered for yahoo speaks volumes.
MSN was, at first inception, meant to be *the* portal to the internet. That failed so fast most people don't even know it. The new Microsoft search site? Know anyone that uses it? cos I don't, and I know a lot of computer users, ranging from expert to pebmak's. Not one Microsoft web strategy has succeeded. Ok, ok, people use Hotmail, and people use msn messenger. Alas that's not much of a money maker for Microsoft, not without the original ill conceived all encompassing Microsoft Network.
So, they now know that without buying out another major search company they can't compete in search or net advertising. The problem there is that they have no assurance that the purchase will help them at all?
First, they can't drop the Yahoo! name, or people simply won't use the product. Secondly, adding it to their monolithic corporation will most likely result in innovation at yahoo (is there any? I'm out of touch) will also slow to a crawl.
Microsoft have been good at (well, successful at) operating systems and office software. Their mistake is believing that the same strategy can be extended to maintain a dominant position in other fields that didn't even exist when they first became dominant.
Most likely outcome of a purchase? Five years down the line it is spun off as a separate business again, related to Microsoft by shares only.
Re:Of couse (Score:5, Insightful)
Yahsoft.
I fail to see how this creates anything but more headaches and "me-too" problems for Microsoft - but it does confirm for me (if not Netcraft!) that Microsoft has a serious problem when it comes to creating new ideas and following through on them.
I used to joke about Microsoft buying all of it's new ideas - but this is a rather bigger problem. Once they buy Yahoo, do they transition it into a new form of MSN, thereby killing everything that was cool about Yahoo? Or do they un-MSN the current Microsoft web properties?
The problem Microsoft has is that when it comes to finding information and using the web to share information, Google has the most useful tools for the largest number of people. Buying a languishing Yahoo won't magically make Microsoft popular.
Biggest doesn't win here - subjectively best does.
unix/windows (Score:5, Insightful)
Which will ruin it and waste the first 50 billion. (Score:5, Insightful)
Wonder how much additional it'll cost to convert Yahoo's BSD servers to Windows. Remember how long (and how many failed attempts) there were to convert HotMail from Solaris?
If they do that, their share will drop from 38% to whatever they have now. Just look at what they have done to Amazon's search - my wife says it's unusable and quit going there. If they convert Yahoo over to their stuff like they did Yahoo, there will be no difference between Yahoo and their own search and their share will fall back to what it is today and then further. You would think that Google eating Hotmail's lunch would have taught them a lesson. The data they get would also soon lose it's value if they can't figure out how to use it.
Re:That would be great... (Score:1, Insightful)
The funny thing is if they do it, people will leave yahoo. Regardless whether they'd rebrand it or not. Mark my words.
What do you think? (Score:4, Insightful)
Once they buy Yahoo, do they transition it into a new form of MSN, thereby killing everything that was cool about Yahoo? Or do they un-MSN the current Microsoft web properties?
Hotmail!
Amazon Search!
Zune!
They keep taking and ruining winners, delivering to the public exactly what no one wants. Hotmail was cool, then M$ bought it and spent a fortune converting it to M$ software, loading it with adds and making it suck. Google mail kicked their ass. Amazon used to have a good search, then along came M$. There's nothing wrong with the electronics factories that make iPod and all the rest of the wold's music players, but Zune is a squirting loser. Is a picture emerging here?
Re:holy crap (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:indeed this says a lot (Score:3, Insightful)
YAHOO: 250 million
MSFT: 228 million
AOL MAIL: 50 million
GOOGLE: 51 million
US WEBMAIL MARKET
YAHOO: 79 million
MSFT: 45 million
AOL MAIL: 40 million
GOOGLE: 10 million
source: http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/11/09/single-ajax-
I'm not certain that ALL of MSFT's web strategies have been failures. I also am not certain that the strategies to success by any of the companies in this list differ greatly: they all are too large to be genuinely innovative - as innovation is a byproduct of necessity - and these companies are not needy by virtue of success. All of these firms buy companies that add value - they buy smaller innovative firms that are forced to be innovative by virtue of lack of size - and they use cash to muscle competitors. It's the clash of the titans. Not to use a cliche - but it's the second mouse to the mousetrap that gets the cheese.
re: microsoft needing to buy another firm to be relevant in search - this is akin to Google knowing that they need to buy youtube in order to be relevant in video.
this doesn't sound like a good deal on paper because microsoft obviously has some marketing issues to resolve. they will devalue the yahoo brand by association. but in looking for ways to muscle into search - they are smartly addressing the notion that their problems in search are culture-based - they need to get good search work from outside. A slashdotter has an awesome sig - something to the effect of: envy is not being born with a competitive advantage and being afraid or unwilling to go out and acquire one.
Microsoft is a very successful company. regardless of one's emotional response to their strategies - they are obviously effective - as Google - in the purchase of youtube, writely, doubleclick, and other firms - has shown a penchant for buying their way to prominence as well - while focusing on core business to generate the revenue that fuels these purchases.
Re:What do you think? (Score:1, Insightful)
They loaded Hotmail down with ads before Text based ads became the craze. GMail had the benefit of coming around well after everyone else and after their Adsense became common place.
Where was '$' in Amazon $earch? They switched to Microsoft Live based search because Google was trying to screw them over.
I gladly admit that I use Google for every search first, and only go to the "others" upon failure of Google to find what I want, which is rare because I usually do very specific searches. With that said, MS Live is my next stop even before Yahoo because its results are actually pretty good, just not always as good as Google's--it would be interesting to see a good mix of both Yahoo and Live search's weighted result sets to get possibly better results than Google, or maybe not. Also, I use GMail and Yahoo mail, but not Hotmail.
MS Live's image search is much better than Google's though.
I see the picture you're drawing though, you blindly hate Microsoft and everything they do/make; even the stuff worth mentioning, such as the Zune and its weak, but still innovative WiFi tech. You're probably the exact same person applauding every purchase made by Google for their innovative insight (or some other BS you likely use to justify it). YouTube? Can't beat it, so they bought it.
Re:indeed this says a lot (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd love to know why MS still tries. Either in fields where becoming dominant is a mighty large challenge (like with MSN), but also in areas where they are never going to be able to extract profit (like Internet Explorer). I can understand giving things a shot, but there must come a point where it's best to cut your losses. Other than some irrational fear that if they don't control everything then the core will wither away, I can't see any reason for them to continue down several of the paths that they are taking.
Re:What do you think? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:What do you think? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's so funny how Microsoft's success must be measured as an absolute when you are so trying so desperately to re-arrange reality to make them look bad. How many Microsoft products have failed, twitter? I mean, really failed? What, "Bob" and Zune? Out of thousands of them? Out of uncounted billions of dollars in revenue over the past 30 years, "Bob" and "Clippy" are your best examples of why "M$" is about to die and go away?
Seriously?
Microsoft doesn't need to dethrone Google with MSN and outsell the PS2. They don't. I'm sure they'd feel better if they did, but they quite simply don't. Their success doesn't need to be absolute. Other companies usually need to, but MS doesn't.
Consider Google. They're a two-trick pony. Their painfully inflated stock will plummet with first inkling of a problem with the online ad market (not that I would want that to happen, I love Google. But that's not the point). The same event barely makes Microsoft blink. One hiccup in iPod sales and it's pain time for Apple. Microsoft can afford to get it wrong four times with the Zune.
Microsoft doesn't have to dominate markets completely to be successful in them. It's funny that people like you have to point out "M$" does not have absolute domination of a market to prove they have "failed". Would you rather all of those markets were in the same state as the PC desktop today? Holy shit, I'm a Microsoft fanboy but I sure as hell wouldn't want that to happen. Microsoft needs all the competition it can get.
Re:What do you think? (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, that's true, they're not. Especially Vista. The XBox is outsold by Nintendo now, and they have zero presence in Japan.
100% true. The reason they're here today is that IBM gave them a braindead contract in the 80s that put their software on every commodity PC sold. Nobody chose Windows, it was put on all their machines by luck.
Office 2003 was a flop, the last Visual Studio had so many bugs that there was an outcry, and Office 2007 had to have its revenues inflated by the accountants to make it look like it was selling.
Did I leave anything out?