Ways of screaming, “LOOK AT ME!”

What do the following companies have in common? Ebay, Facebook, Myspace and Microsoft (please suggest others in comments).

Answer – they’ve all launched an ‘open’ platform for developers in the hope of stimulating or rejuvenating their core business. It seems that in the web world, once a company hits a certain size/maturity level that throttles and chokes the development of new ideas, the trend is to throw out an element to the developer space in the hope that something better will come from it. But is that always necessarily the case? They could just sell stuff.

Let’s compare that notion to Amazon who launched S3 and their suite of web services with an immediate openness so that it would be embraced from the word ‘go’ by developers as a strong yet flexible tool. Granted it’s in a different arena, but is there something to be said here about having an open strategy from the beginning of a business’ operations?

As well as opening up another chunk of their site, Ebay have partnered with a Vietnamese startup. This type of behaviour is not new from Ebay who, quite sensibly, have in the past collaborated or acquired national/local level auction sites in Asia to gain the specialisation of language and culture. One wonders if they’d adapt their structure in the future to take the trading down to a much more local level in Craigslist style, or if they’d look to go social by pushing their own messaging systems and allow greater in-site sharing on top of their current activities loading Ebay widgets into every other social network on the web.

When putting my face on the Zuckspace, my concerns lie primarily in what the media and authorities tell me about privacy, and then my experience as a consumer begins to become tiresome with the constant nagging of a thousand different invitations to join up to some virally marketed application with zero useful functionality. Imagine a parallel world where from day 1, Mark had opened doors on thefacebook to the developer community and attracted business through being 100% public about changes to services, rather than the ‘by-the-way we added this’ approach. Myspace wouldn’t have stood a chance, and maybe we’d have a half decent set of apps that are useful for our daily routines. It sickens me how much VC money goes into widgets and such, with no real revenue coming back out.

I think openness is something that business analysts should start to use to gauge the level of maturity or desperation of a company. Perhaps in some instances it’s just something of a gimmick in which case the company in question should be exposed as a surfer of the trend wave. Opening a developer platform or a part of your product is a huge move, and any company taking steps down that path should learn to walk before they start to run. I look forward to a time when VCs and angels see in potential investments the strength of an idea that embraces community, social and open concepts in a sensible and straight-forward blend. As the last couple of years have seen the web turn social, it is certain that the immediate future holds for someone the opportunity to make a big win by finding the perfect business model and in my opinion that will find its roots in the beekeeper open source example.

Openness for the purpose of having some hope to clutch on to as your firm levels off isn’t something anyone should push for, so instead we should ask these maturing companies to get smart and openly talk to each other. The future lies in good communication and the portability of services. EA Maxis have released their new game Spore which is the perfect example for what I’m trying to illustrate – there’s a real market out there for products that make sharing information simple and that blur the boundaries between our online and offline experience. The ability to make YouTube videos of game play and add them in-game is incredible, and I hope that GameVee take note of where games like Spore are going, and try to get some good partnerships in motion with game makers.

The directions that companies in the general tech but especially web2.0 fields need to be looking at are vertical (online and offline – helped already by Google Gears and Yahoo! Browser Plus), horizontal (desktop, laptop, giant plasma screen, UMPC or cell/mobile/smart phone – lets have a seamless experience wherever) and everything else in between which I’m naming ‘diagonally’ for want of a better word (integrating and cooperating with services provided by others that could make for sensible partnering and sharing). We’re all still waiting on total perfection in the ‘horizontal’ direction: I’m talking about mobile browsing and the recognised unfulfilled potential.

The latest developer craze is surely all about Apple’s shiny new iPhone (or not). VC activity is bound to go off the scale as startups show the world how you really make use of a platform. I’m praying that mobile platforms generally, whether Android or LiMo or iPhone, find productive and helpful apps housed, and that they don’t spin out of control like social network platforms have all seemed to. I’d love to be able to take ‘digital nomad’ really mobile… or rather, on my mobile. Currently that project is, for me, simply limited to getting all my operations inside a browser.

Firefox 3 has been officially released today, and hopefully now that’s out of the way Mozilla can take a step back and analyse their next moves on mobile platforms. Being a browser maker, they certainly sit in a favourable position, one in which they could stand to soak up an even greater number of users should they adapt products for ‘touchy’ devices.

Unsurprisingly RIM’s Blackberry line up contains a touch phone, and the phrase ‘line up’ is the exact reason that they’re going to keep making money despite just how great the new iPhone might be – there’s so much more choice for consumers. Besides, let’s not forget the business users that swear by them and their hardcore functionality.

Now that Windows 7 is in motion and we have days of staring at our grubby finger prints to look forward to, I think it’s high time that Windows Mobile caught up with Apple’s shiny software. I make no apology for using the word ’shiny’ twice next to ‘Apple’ – I’m no Mac Fanboy, I just think they deserve credit for making flashy (even though, laughably, Adobe Flash STILL isn’t on the iPhone) gizmos that everyone else can copy and make more practical. Microsoft need to push and push their speed at rolling out products and services because I don’t think it’ll be long now before their competitors gain enough market share and publicity to make everyone locked into their brand able to see the shiny stuff and lust after it.

Talking about the Big 3 (and AOL) is unavoidable in this blog post, and I’m not sorry about that. I’ve been avidly following this drama for months and have watched Microsoft’s obsession with joining the online advertising business grow. I strongly agree with Henry Blodget’s latest comment that this isn’t what Microsoft needs, it should focus on corporate business and make its core products so strong that they keep hold of their oligopoly.

I ca(h)n’t take this (bad pun? I don’t care) obnoxious muscling in on affairs and trying to force a sale just as much as I can’t believe how resilient (perhaps arrogant) Jerry has proven to be. He’s frozen the hiring, offered up a package to his quitting employees, and signed the deal with Google. Most incredible of all is just how severed any ties are with Microsoft and how badly this is reflecting on stock, as raised by NYT’s Joe Nocera. So what’s next?

I was so convinced at one stage that Microhoo would happen, and now it hasn’t I’m keeping my lips sealed. Others have not, and think that whilst Yahoo! would do well from acquiring AOL, it’s not going to happen because Microsoft will continually inject an offer that’s higher than Jerry’s, both out of spite for that poison pill and to feed the ad obsession.

Options? Great… Pick one!

The Microhoo situation has made some considerable developments since I last posted on the subject. Sadly though Jerry and his board haven’t made their minds up yet, but that’s justified to an extent now that so many interesting options have presented themselves. Next Tuesday we’ll get to see Yahoo’s earnings report which will (hopefully) give everyone a big clue as to where this is going. Of course other Q1 numbers that will prove interesting are those of AOL – rumoured to be down to the tune of 25-30%. Platform A is being streamlined, which has a short term cost cutting win and could be used to adjust the compatibility of the team for any longer term aspirations such as say a merger with Yahoo!

AOL’s moves as of late have been focused on turnaround. First Bebo was acquired for $850 million, allowing AOL to own a social network and have access to a lot of users. This huge jigsaw puzzle piece will give AOL what it needs over the next few years to allow it to compete with the big players on the Internet. Combined with Platform A, it means they can keep everything that’s ad revenue based in house which is much more respectable than just outsourcing to Google; aka admitting defeat or Yahoo’s great idea. Platform A has taken on Verizon’s web and mobile properties, offering AOL a real opportunity to lead innovation on how to target ads at the mobile internet and its ever increasing number of users. Ultimately whoever gets this right first will hit the jackpot, and the brain power Google has at its disposal makes competition high, so teaming with Verizon on this journey boosts AOL’s chances of success.

Next up, relationships have been built to boost usability and accessibility of AIM, but in this field allowing Google to merge GTalk contacts with AIM buddies is not admitting defeat to Google. It’s a sensible move because it keeps hold of those users that were slowly discovering that the switching costs of going to Google might actually be cheaper and more efficient; as well as being in line with the trend wave of opening up access for communication through web2.0’s like Meebo.

On April 15th, Sphere announced it had been bought buy AOL. Sphere started as a blog search engine that would compete directly with giants like Technorati and Google Blog Search, but it rapidly differentiated itself by becoming a related content engine. In short, it allowed blogging to link itself and search through the big news media sites, generating related stories from big news sites when viewing a blog. This acquisition will now sit squarely inside AOL’s content sites. AOL has been doing a good job of keeping these content sites fresh and relevant, with their recent launch of a women’s lifestyle site for example. There have been other acquisition moves that have made important differences to AOL’s sites and using Platform A ads on them, such as Goowy Media the widget makers and Perfiliate Technologies the Internet marketing specialists. The complete chain looks something like this:

AOL Content sites –> Bebo and public blogging of content –> Platform A ads generate revenue –> Back to start

As dumbed down as this might seem, it’s important to realise that AOL were lacking some of these critical elements (or components of these elements) only a few years ago; and that if they’ve got their heads sewn on properly, they’ll figure out how to make something of the mobile web. At least there’s a clear path that cash is flowing in, and it’s an encouraging direction. But it seems to me that there are two thought patterns or objectives at work inside the top management think-tank. The first objective shows us we have a company that’s trying to pull off this turn around and stand on its own two feet, whilst the opposing decision makers want to see AOL sold to Yahoo! (or anyone that will realistically buy them) to make some cash for TimeWarner.

Does no one else see the problem with this? Right now, having two objectives creates no conflict as they are both achieved by boosting the company’s size, revenue… essentially every method you have of measuring the success of a company. The problem arises when Yahoo! caves to M$’s persistence and leaves AOL out in the cold, or when something similarly devastating takes place in an environment outside of AOL’s control. We are going to see top management fighting it out over which path is right for them, with little or no consideration for the end user.

Digital Nomad… the conclusion

At the last LUG meet, I presented my findings from the Digital Nomad project I undertook, along with wifi encryption hacking (in theory). This project was started because of hard disk failure, complete paranoia at ever losing anything, and curiosity – can you JUST use a browser and some cunning Web2.0 offerings to run your life? (See Running your life and BACKUP posts) It has now officially concluded and I’m very proud to say the answer is YES! I gave myself bonus points for services that are free or dirt cheap.

Here’s the full list of services that come with the MLED “I like this” seal of approval:

Google Docs: If you have a Gmail account, utilise all the associated features to the fullest. You can put almost all your eggs in this one basket – Google provide blogging, reading, email, calendar, docs & spreads, photos, and they even have had a stab at social networking. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The best news is that Google Gears is being extended to include Google Docs, making this even more suited to serious and/or business needs. Gears lets you continue everything off-line, essentially your work is backed up and collaborated/shared as soon as you go online. Big thumbs up for Google.

Zoho: Google’s offerings have this superb competitor. They seem to be leading the way on some of their innovations, I’ve not found better or an alternative. This is very seriously geared towards businesses, and they do charge for heavy usage. Features that look particularly note worthy are Invoice, Projects, CRM and DB & Reports products. I have stopped using this suite because Google is too convenient and easy for me, but if you’re seriously looking to undertake a shift to the web-centric domain, do NOT ignore Zoho.

Scribd: The YouTube of documents. At the end of this year, I’ll probably upload some of my notes to actually participate in the sharing. This site has a great store of docs, white papers and articles and uses ads to monetise. I have found it immensely helpful as a resource so far, but it’s not quite like Wikipedia in terms of quick access to general knowledge. It’s the opposite angle to document making Web2.0 suites – it wants you to upload all your old notes and documents for sharing in the cloud, rather than providing you with a way to make new ones. They have an API and some interesting ways of embedding documents, presumably aimed more at journalists. I could see some potential uses for this as documents backup and hosting technical manuals.

Seeqpod: If my mp3 player is not pumping beats into my brain, then Seeqpod is how I now get at music. It’s superb. You can build playlists or just randomly search/stumble your way around tunes.

Flickr: Yahoo! did good. I absolutely love Flickr, and it is serves as a backup as well as a way of publicly displaying photos for me. I have forked out for a pro account so that I can freely display and store as much as I dare. A lot of people use Facebook for photos, but I’m not in favour of this as it cuts down images, doesn’t quite have the same freedom as “sets” and “collections”. But lets face it, Flickr is designed specifically for photos, whereas Facebook is now something of a joke where I now get spammed by silly application invitations.

Liquid Planner: Worth a click if you’re a manager. As the title might suggest, it makes planning easy and fluid. I have yet to properly start using this, so I can’t really give too much feedback on how it handles, but the account I have, the interface, and the feature list are all very impressive. A lot of people talk, blog about, and use Basecamp for business, and based on its popularity alone I recommend it in the same breath. I’ve not tried it though, so it’s not properly featuring in this list.

Jungle Disk: Storage and backup pleasure. Uses Amazon S3 at the moment, and should another company like M$ or Google release an alternative then I’m sure the company will explore using those as a back-end. They’re working on version 2.0 of the software which is already cross platform and superb. They’ve just taken on a new worker and announced a bundle of features that they plan on adding.

Meebo: Messaging made easy. I have messaging accounts on Yahoo, MSN, GTalk, Jabber and I’m looking into AIM now that they’ve partnered with Meebo and started to crawl back into the spotlight. Before I used Pidgin to unite all those accounts in one window, but now I use Meebo because it does the same but inside a browser. As a bonus, they have some products that they’re constantly adding to and updating, my favourite so far being the Meebo Me blog plugin —->

Netvibes: Homepage 2.0 and they’re French! This makes the perfect home page as you can literally put anything in a widget, so I no longer have to visit MySpace and wade through ads to check my messages, nor do I have to visit online comic pages. I’m probably missing out on half the features they have because I honestly haven’t found time to explore, but it’s certainly very powerful and worth looking at.

Blist: I got an email from them yesterday saying they’ve added social features – i.e. proper collaboration and sharing with permissions. This is a superb place to work on and collaborate on databases, and more specialised than Zoho’s offering I think.

Remember the Milk!: A reminders plugin for Gmail that sits where relevant text ads would normally be in the right hand column. This is incredibly useful for both simple and comprehensive to do lists. There’s also a plugin for Google Calendar that I haven’t explored because it provides text message reminders just like Google Calendar does, and I was worried that I’d get the two confused or conflicting.

I Want Sandy: My new PA! Remember the Milk! has passed by for me now because I Want Sandy acts fairly human and allows you to add entries to task lists and a calendar via text message, texting you back with reminders. UK residents need to communicate with the service via Twitter at the moment because it doesn’t have phone support for networks other than O2 UK and T-Mobile UK (I think). Twitter is the future, so even if your phone network is supported out of the box, grab a Twitter account anyway.

The concept of Digital Nomad is something I’ve come to both enjoy and rely upon, but with the good comes some disadvantages. Whilst you have a free (£/$/€) set of apps that you can access on literally any internet connected device, it limits you to such devices. Being permanently connected can prove costly in certain areas of the world! Additionally, I think it’ll be a long while yet before professional and specialist tools such as video, music and photo editing suites reach the internet platform. So don’t throw out your computer and bulky software suites yet, there’s still a few years of life needed from them. But what this project has shown is that being on a public terminal or a friend’s laptop shouldn’t slow you down if you’ve got the right service accounts.

For Kluggers: here is the link to the wifi hacking tutorial I discussed at the meet.

Recession around the corner? Doom doom doom… or not.

I read a great article in the Financial Times yesterday about the fear of recession, which must currently be hovering above the heads of everyone over in Silicon Valley. Just in the same way that in 2000 the tech giants tried to play down the likelihood of one taking place, we see even more alarming evidence through this constant dominance game play that’s taking place. The ‘Microhoo’ frenzy, the deeply complex politics that surrounded the 700 mhz auction, the ways in which different companies did or didn’t roll out all/some of their products at CES or the mobile device conference, talk and rumours that float around forums and blogs of mergers and alliances: these all have seeds of worry sewn into them, that to many are beginning to look like more than just the regular state of play.

My view is one of “so what?” because we passed through one recession at the start of the millennium and the other side of it has seen some awe-inspiring innovation. If this next one does happen, I hope it makes some of the giants think about consolidating their positions and looking to longer term and more sustainable strategies. And I really hope that some of the startups that hit the scene as it kicks off make it through to the other side so that we get to see the innovation boom on the up-curve. It would suck to be a founder and watch your idea drown because of bad timing.

The last recession came after the crazy boom/bubble of the dotcom. What is this one following? Certainly innovation in the PC makers domain, and what’s cool for them is that the revenues and cash flows of these companies is much higher and more stable than it was for the poor dotcoms that had to pass the rigors of the 2000 recession.

I’m not worrying for companies like HP and Cisco who have provided commentary on what they see on the horizon, because I’m optimistic any slump will be short lived. It will force some of the giants that have been toying with acquisitions to stop, take stock, evaluate their position, and develop inwardly – ensuring the integration and compatibility of the services that all their subsidiaries provide is adequate to move forwards once the other side of the recession is reached.

Really the biggest sector that will feel the heat of a potential recession is the advertising, search and social networking world. The Facebook craze has passed, and people are just waking up to the quantity of personal data that’s been created in the mean time, which is causing concern and making many review their use of social networking services. Facebook are fast becoming yesterday’s news because everything that everyone was really looking forward to with the company has happened – they have launched; half the online world has signed up; a platform/API has been launched; applications have come into our lives, annoyed us, and been tossed into an optional second page of our profiles or plainly deleted; Microsoft has bought a slice of the ad revenue cake (hello M$, what are you doing with this??); a program caused scandal with our personal data and shocked a realisation as to how open our details are to the world; and now we just wait for … what?

Google have spent their time since 2000 just growing and buying, almost in a whimsical way. They, for me, have been the most fun to watch in an acquisitions and general game play sense. They’ve definitely got the assets to chide them through this possible period, but what’s going to be their first move on the other side? I’m frantically waiting for Google to shock me. I’d be really pleasantly surprised if they could release an Amazon S3 rival and an Apple mobile device running their own OS on their own network. When you think of all it’s achieved, it’s amazing to think that their core business is still search and advertising. I’m looking to Google for a solution that keeps both consumers and businesses connected to the Cloud wherever they are and whenever they need to be. Someone wrote an article today that I got in the GigaOm daily email saying they believe Google should buy Adobe to gain their resources and knowledge, but they were looking more closely at AIR. Surely though, the potential that that kind of acquisition has is more complex and incredible than just AIR, but it’s a good point. Microsoft, too, would benefit greatly from adding Adobe to their portfolio.

Whatever way you look at it, if you’re a decision maker in the valley right now you should be looking to cut costs and push for the greatest possible market share. Startups – if you haven’t already, get your venture funding on speed dial. If today’s article in The Guardian is to be believed, the “Queue for the soup kitchen may start here”.

On the other side of the fence…

On the other side of the fence from this ‘Microhoo’ situation, I believe the following will come to be over with Google, Apple and AT&T:

AT&T will work on developing stronger ties with Apple inside their current partnership. We all hope that things only get stronger for the iPhone on AT&T. This will evolve into a working relationship in the area of the 700mhz spectrum. AT&T will get Apple’s appetite wetted for using the available blocks to get into Android alongside Google. Apple will drag AT&T into the Android Google field as it has shown interest in knocking other companies out of D block bidding by themselves not bidding. AT&T then wants to go on and develop their own strategic relationship (possible alliance) with Google to provide a pure feed to access Google’s own mobile internet.

If you remember, Google was buying up all those old cables across the United States. Attaching their massive network of super computers to these cables would be enough to build their own “Googlenet” that can be accessed on Apple Devices. It can also be reached running an Android-Google-OpenSocial-OpenPlatform device so created by various other companies can compete with Apple and with Microsoft-Yahoo! Devices. You see, Yahoo! will bring to Microsoft a suite of media services and an enormous user base that it can latch onto its mobile OS.

Microsoft will now also apparently have a hand in the development of devices such as Side-Kick. This will of course have the effect of finally driving people from 2g to 2.5g and through into full 3g, which is perfect as our infrastructure greatly needs investment. We will consequently begin to run WiFi much more on devices, hopefully pushing the gradual jumps into the 700mhz blocks and encouraging both the blending of WiFi and Bluetooth and the development and growth of WiMAX.

If only…

Microhoo

Let’s face it, right now this is the biggest item to hit any and all business tech media. I’ve been trawling all my usual sources and they’re all providing their own coverage, even Mr. Shpigler the ’shark’ appears on the front page of Snotr (Mininova’s new video site) with this angle on negotiations:

(Edit: I can’t make the Snotr video embed. I’m working on it, but for the moment just click here to see it. Sorry!)

And why shouldn’t they be covering it? The effect and fallout from this move is what I believe will put 2008 on the map as that year when we expected “baby steps” happening (recalling coverage on GigaOm where the big prediction for 2008 was consolidating services and the blurring of lines between online and offline services) but instead got “bigfoot steps”, where suddenly we not only need to look at the innovations provided by wave after wave of super slick web 2.0 (and beyond) startups, but also at the Big Players.

My favourite coverage to date came tumbling out of my printer this morning because I thought it merited being a hard copy (“eww” – is how I usually view hard copies with that same disgusted look as The Plague from Hackers, but this really was good) which came from Bloomberg.com (kudos Ari Levy) and is now on ‘Update 3′ of the story. What I liked about this article was its detail, as we are told even what parties are whispering in the ears of Microsoft’s and Yahoo’s decision-makers. So hats off to Morgan Stanley who apparently don’t only make the shiniest credit card in my wallet, but are also accomplished consultants who have tents pitched outside Redmond right now.

What irks me though is that no one seems to care to DO something with this coverage, like go out on a limb and tell the world not just what the potential consequences of all of this are, but which one of those is most likely to play out. So I figured I’d have a try:

Potential scenario #1 (aka Most likely)
Microsoft drop an offer in Mr. Yang’s letterbox (subtle dig at how long this event is taking to unfold, it’s almost like they’re writing to each other with snail mail) to the tune of $35 per share, still with their 50/50 money/shares split, but this time give it the “don’t push your luck sonny” seal because we all know Yahoo! are going to ask time and again for it to be tipped beyond the $40 threshold.
Yahoo! accept because they’re running out of options and money so fast that soon they’ll start to lose the confidence of those 250+million users that they have from the glory days. What no one can predict is how well the two company’s services integrate. I sincerely hope that Yahoo!s successful projects like Flickr and delicious get used effectively.
Should Microsoft go down the integration path with Yahoo! products, then they should do this as if walking on eggshells and look only to make boundaries between entities blurred. What I mean by that relates back to my original point on GigaOm’s 2008 prediction of consolidating services. So many services have certain features that we prefer, be that because they’re better or easier, meaning that the average user of these online services has to have a million different accounts and logins. I am mega keen on ideas like OpenID, and we’re told now that some of the bigger companies like Microsoft and Google are signing up to these which can only be seen as a positive step.
I’m drifting, so my point is that when the time comes, Microsoft should set an example to Google of the best way to integrate another firm into your own and it should be open to the Yahoo! ways of leaving a product’s name and subsequent image well alone.
It should also ignore my last point when it comes to MSN Messenger and Yahoo! Instant Messenger – join them up – and work on a truly genius way to manage media. Yahoo! has some great media ideas that could really help out Microsoft with its online competition against Google. Microsoft clutch at Windows and Office because they are the standard now. But once people need more ‘on-the-go’ features and collaboration ability, then people are going to start to look towards Google Docs and Spreads, Zoho and all the other countless greats that are out there on the internet. I think that Yahoo! could really help Microsoft achieve their Office Live goals.

Potential scenario #2:
Google and Yahoo! end up uniting against Microsoft. This seems pretty unlikely to me. The Bloomberg article states that Eric Schmidt and Jerry Yang spoke on 4th February about a partnership. This would be huge for Google, who’d suddenly have one less competitor to think about in their home domain of search and advertising as they’d gain the resources of Yahoo!
But just how likely is this? In my opinion not very likely at all. I’d actually like this not to happen. I’m a firm believer in there being healthy competition, because it’s important to remember that competition drives innovation. Whilst Google’s insane growth rate since 2004 is something that deserves a sizable pat on the back for each and every member of their staff, it’s not going to continue at that pace if they’ve got no one to be in a race against.
BUT (yes, this but is much bigger) what’s especially important to note is that Google aren’t trying to BUY Yahoo!, they want a partnership. What does this really mean? It means that we’re looking at a different strategy type. Microsoft’s can be seen as dominant and expansive, and Google are simply just playing against that. They’re not actually interested or threatened by Yahoo! alone, and in creating this partnership, Yahoo! would still be stood on its own two feet. They know that ‘Microhoo’ would be a much greater blip on their radar, so the suggestion of a partnership is a play at Yang’s fierce independant streak. Very clever Mr. Schmidt!

Potential scenario #3:
Yahoo! stay solo. As mentionned in #2, Yang clearly (and quite rightly, he made a big player) has a fierce pride in his company, and would love to see it stood solely on its own platform, with its gigantic user base and smooth set of media features. It is at this stage that I’d like to say SORT IT OUT with Yahoo! Live, because I’m reading lots of bad things about the service. But that’s all I’m going to say, because I’m sure it must be seriously difficult to roll out something like that, to that many people, while being in the media spotlight, with a takeover proposition looming over your head. I am a big fan of Yahoo – in fact I think Yahoo was my first email account as a child and I even wore my Yahoo baseball cap to “Geeks vs Chavs” night at my local watering-hole to show my support – I’d love to see them continue to thrive on their own, to be my underdog in the “Big 3″ (Microsoft, Google and Yahoo! – what I currently deem as the three biggest players in tech) and to show everyone what it means to have that many trusting consumers that are there because they get an excellent service.
How likely is this though? I think it’s slightly more likely than a partnership with Google (perhaps), but lets face it, the stakeholders over at Yahoo! are seeing more $$$ coming their way by walking the M$ path. They’d be pretty stupid to stir Microsoft up, get them bidding in the price bracket that they’ve been angling for, and then to turn them down. Similarly, Microsoft could (relatively) easily just storm on in with a hostile takeover.

If asked to put my money where my mouth is, I’d be hedging my bets on Microsoft winning this round. I think they’ll suggest a price more in the direction that Yahoo! are hoping for, and Yang will announce that they’ve taken it.