Microsoft offers $44 billion to buy Yahoo, Google scared
It has been a while since our last Tech News post and many things has happened during this time. Probably the most significant news was Microsoft’s offer to buy Yahoo for astonishing $44.6 billion. According to latest news, Google doesn’t like it too much: they said Sunday that Microsoft’s proposed takeover of Yahoo could pose a number of potential threats to competition that need to be examined by policymakers around the world. Google said in a blog post on its Web site that given Microsoft’s anti-competitive conduct in the past and its continued dominance in the technology industry, the proposed transaction could pose threats to “innovation and openness” on the Internet. But Google’s broadly worded concerns lacked detailed claims about the anticompetitive effects of the deal, and the company did not ask federal regulators to take any specific actions at this time.
“Could a combination of the two take advantage of a PC software monopoly to unfairly limit the ability of consumers to freely access competitors’ e-mail, IM, and Web-based services?” Mr. Drummond, Google senior vice president, asked. Yahoo and Microsoft also run two of the most heavily trafficked portals on the Internet, Mr. Drummond noted. Google’s reaction suggests the Internet search giant may be preparing to do its best to derail or delay any merger. If so, the strategy would mirror Microsoft’s own actions with respect to Google’s proposed acquisition of online advertising specialist DoubleClick for $3.1 billion. It’s obvious Yahoo on its own can’t compete with Google, but I’m not sure if this is the right way…
Source: NY Times
I guess Bill Gates really is down with O.P.P.!
Google scared? I can’t see Microsoft’s possible acquisition of Yahoo! doing anything to draw people from Google. Seems more like a way to keep them away for good.
Well in there bid to take over the world they also buy ford gm and chrysler for bottem basement prices
Good to see rlslog is keeping up to date with last week’s news.
looks more like Microsoft is afraid and trying to buy out as much of the oppisition as possible….
trying to monopolize itself legally i guess
yep, old news but at least it was posted because it’s important
nay…..Live.com is responsible for about 4 percent of the total searches conducted online, Yahoo little above 10 percent, and Google is taking up about 80 percent of ALL searches…so I really don’t think a combination of Live and Yahoo would help at ALL…..If M$ had all that money to invest in freaking Yahoo.com, why don’t they cut the price of their products ($400 vista, anyone?), or just invest that money to better their search engine? I mean…the fact is, the best engine gets the prey, so Google is still going to dominate so long as it’s still the best search engine around….
Google will stay on the top =)
roflmao
googles just pissed because there is nothing they can do and if yahoo accepts google will still be the best search engine around
Yahoo, now with the added failures of microsoft. Just useless. Google will always be superior.
Any rapidshare links to the money ?
As a long time user of Yahoo, I sure hope this doesn’t happen.
http://rapidshare.com/files/88561300/microsoft.funds.to.yahoo.
yeah..if Yahoo is bought by Microsoft ..might as well kiss it goodbye..I hear Gates is running for President in 2012 with the Antichrist
@ 14
lol but i dont think this will change much for yahoo. i mean look at what happened with youtube, its still the same layout, the url is still the same… i mean if they bought it i guess they could just shut it down to get rid of the competition… roflmao buy something for $44 billion just to shut it down
@ 13
File not found 
anyway i just hope that microcrap don’t miss with FreeBSD serves
Google should let M$ buy Yahoo.
Yahoo is on its way out, and Yahoo joining the M$ camp will pretty much guarantee it’s demise thus leaving the way open for Google to dominate the world.
Wow, US$44.000,000.000… wow… that’s why it’s M$… i’m surprised, IMO M$ is desperate to compete with Google. Let’s see what happens in the future.
Who the hell uses yahoo for anything anymore?
Google scared? Of what two dead dogs trying to stay on top by desperately getting into bed together.
I don’t see what the big deal is, Google is far better than Yahoo and MSN combined, I don’t see it being much of a threat, besides Google is one of the most amazing company of free software out there.
if yahoo doesnt accept the offer, microsoft will do an agressive takeover which means buying shares to own a certain percentage to have power. smart move.
I work withing google, and believe me we are not in any way scared. Let the media speak.
within*
Seriously, what has Yahoo done? Google keeps coming out with these cool new (free) web-apps, and Microsoft is creating a bunch of (mostly for fee) products all the time. What is Yahoo good for besides Yahoo Messenger and… well really that’s it?
I don’t see what the big fuss is. Google is so far ahead of the game especially in terms of Web 2.0. At the end of the day, Microsoft can acquire every search engine and Google-like company all they want and still not be able to compete.
Wow… everybody here really hates Yahoo!..
I like Y!, you have a problem with that? I’ve used it for my email for years and never had a problem with it, except the occasional spam but theres not a whole lot you can do about those is there?
Give them a break… if M$ buys Y! then it could work out for the better. Think about it- M$ has the funds, Y! has the smart people. Together, they could take over. I don’t ever use Y! search, but the other services they offer are enough to stay. What does Google have, email and a cheaply put together “personal” page?
I’ll stick with the big “Y” and leave the G’s outta this…
Something the article fails to mention is that Google at the same time is trying to purchase AOL, though not as certain still a possibility.
@26
Just email and a cheap homepage? What about search? what about documents? what about maps? what about video? what about their RSS reader? sketchup? groups? orkut? picasa?
Dont get me wrong, Im not some sort of a fanboy, but saying google is just email is wrong. As well as saying that Microsoft is buying Yahoo! not because they want to leave no competition.
mm does google have like yahoo the yahoo answers? thats the only thing i like bout yahoo
yahoo? lol.. that’s so 1999…
@28
fine then. they offer many more services, but I’ll still support the underdogs… you can keep your multi-billion dollar corporations. I’ll admit that I use Gogle Earth and sometimes Maps, but that’s about it for me, anyway.
That money should be spent on poverty. Not to shutdown a business. WHATS WRONG WITH THIS WORLD?
I wouldn’t pay jack for that overrated site, i’d sell it in an instant for an offer like that though.
Yahoo is huge in Asia, and Asia is the most rabid growing technology area.
never used yahoo in my life, google ftw!
yahoo voice blows away voip competition in pricing and matches quality/services. that would be my only concern with microsoft having control of them. on the bright side, i hope i never hear one of those stupid “yaaaahooooooo” commercials ever again. google scared, is that a joke? lol… of? no wait, who said that? lol.. what idiot would actually… lmfao
What money have become!
It is 44.6 Billions as stated in the text, but in the headline says 44!
It’s not a mistake by the poster, I didn’t say that.
But the headline just misses $600,000,000!!!
i got bored of talking about this last week…
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7225599.stm
apparently journalists didn’t…
anyway…the net is still new, and customers aren’t too savvy yet, so bad products get used…but the longer it goes on the more dominance google will gain because they’re good at what they do…
microsoft are trying to monopolise because that’s their model…unfortunately they’re applying a real-world model to a virtual-world contest…what google does with innovation, ms tries to equal with money…google ftw.
agree with that!
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DESTINYau
February 4th, 2008 | 07:27
That money should be spent on poverty. Not to shutdown a business. WHATS WRONG WITH THIS WORLD?
çokta sikimdeydi
big news! micro$oft offers $44 billion! to buy rlslog, piratebay scared!
yahoo’s usually my second alternative, & the thing with microsoft is there products are popular because they have the monopoly over most stuff, not many people have anything nice to say about them and rightly so, im sure Google wont have much to worry about