News of Microsoft’s unsolicited offer to buy Internet legend Yahoo at $44.6bn, caught me by surprise. I never though of Yahoo as something you can “buy”. Yes, it is a company, so certainly there must be someone out there with the cash to buy it.
If Yahoo is bought though - at whatever astronomical price, it will come to prove that EVERYTHING on this world is FOR SALE.
Is that a bad thing? Yes, and no. Ah, I love blog topics when there is no obvious conclusion.
Money where made to circulate. And this is a free economy (more or less), so if you can buy something and want to, you might as well go ahead.
Microsoft obviously wants Yahoo. In plain terms, Microsoft is not in a position to compete with Google on the Internet. So, why go out and build quality services which will attract devoted users, when you can buy a ready made company like Yahoo?
However, there are rules in competition. Microsoft has already been fined for it’s practices by the European Union - so I don’t see how a Microsoft - Yahoo merger would be seen favorably in Europe when it will almost definitely conflict with anti-monopoly regulations.
I practically grew up with Yahoo. I remember it as far back as 1996-7, before even Google came into the picture. So I may be a bit sentimental about seeing it diminished or absorbed into Microsoft. Never mind that, this is a “money talks” society, so the way Yahoo has been cornered, I doubt it will manage to continue as is.
I also doubt that a Microsoft-Yahoo merger would be able to better rival Google. In fact, I think the one who will most benefit will be none other than Google itself. For so many reasons. Primarily because Microsoft would again mess up and fail to drive Yahoo to success.
Stories are out already, about a possible counter-proposal to Yahoo from Google. I cannot imagine how people over at Yahoo feel right now, it seems like one of these situations where you would have to choose over the lesser evil. “Which competitor do I surrender to?”, questions must have already been posed.
Oh well. What do you think about it? Would you rather see Yahoo bought by Microsoft, Google, or continue on its own?
