Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft Hijacked Yahoo! from the Inside (Updated)

"You don't need to buy the company, just destroy them and then take their business."

--Duncan 'Dragons Den' Bannatyne



In this latest chapter, there are negotiations for the acquisition of Yahoo's search business. A reader of ours once again points out that a patent which acts as anti-Google kryptonite might be the motive. The patent can be found here and some analysis here: "Google's SEC filings mention a "fully-paid, perpetual license," but they omit the word non-revocable. Patent license terms often include non-revocable in addition to perpetual. Perpetual seems to indicate non-revocability but it really does not. It is unreasonable to expect Google's high-powered lawyers to miss the word non-revocable, so Google's license to the '361 patent is revocable."

For background about this Yahoo! saga, see our previous coverage and analysis, which includes:



There is a lot more in the posts above (including evidence of control being seized from the inside), so that won't be repeated here.

It was probably predictable. This type of deal was coming following a lot of agitation from Microsoft and 'injection' of its own people into Yahoo. Here is another lost boss for Yahoo (from Friday).

Coppel will stay for the handover to his replacement and leave the company in the first quarter of 2009.

Sue Decker, president of Yahoo! Inc, said, “The appointment of Rich Riley represents the next phase in the evolution of our European and Canadian businesses, enabling us to build on the great foundations laid by Toby Coppel.


Microsoft must be aiming at overthrowing the opposition from Yahoo and taking control from the inside rather than from the outside. Yang jumped in after Terry Semel had shown signs of weakness.

Speculations grew just before the American holiday began, particularly because Icahn, whom Microsoft communicates with and probably uses in what's known as a "proxy battle", made his move.

Talks with Microsoft are rumoured to be still going on - possibly just for its search business. And presumably Steve Ballmer is offering a lot less than $33 a share.

Yang's supposed preferred response, an ad deal with Google, has also fallen through.


Here is MarketWatch's report about it.

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Icahn purchased roughly 6.8 million shares in Yahoo...


Lastly, from the Los Angeles Times: Yahoo stock rallies after Carl Icahn increases stake

The company's stock surged 93 cents, or nearly 9%, to $11.51 in the shortened trading session after Icahn, a Yahoo board member who has been pushing a strategy shift or a sale to Microsoft Corp., said he had bought about 6.8 million shares.


There are some other new sightings of Microsoft/Yahoo.

All in all, this has been a brutal and despicable display of power. Some of the moves involved should be illegal and considered white-collar crime.

Update: that original report is being challenged and even refuted now.

A report in the Sunday Times that Microsoft Inc is in talks with Yahoo Inc to buy the U.S. internet company's online search business for $20 billion is "total fiction," according to a key executive cited by an influential U.S. blog.

The Sunday Times, which did not cite its sources, said the proposal under discussion involves a complex transaction that would see the U.S. software giant support a new management team to take control of Yahoo.

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

The Register Bill
The Register MS - putting the "MS" in your centre of the universe
Analogies for "Memory Safety" in Rust
Don't worry, it's Rust! It can do anything!
Nobody Denies That SecureBoot Will Cause Problems After September 11
Not even Microsoft
Gemini Links 06/09/2025: Infinite Scrolling and Posting from Emacs
Links for the day
Links 06/09/2025: GitHub Meltdown Over Slop, "U.S. Jury Says Google Should Pay $425 Million in Privacy Lawsuit"
Links for the day
Despite Its Severe Financial Problems Gnome Foundation Inc Paid Rosanna Yuen Over 100,000 Dollars Last Year
maybe relocation should be considered
The "Left" and the Right"
It poisons everything
Mozilla and Rust Are Not Leftists
they're part of the mass consumerism machine
Disposable to Microsoft
There is an extensive set of people who got used by Microsoft, only to be thrown away a month later or a year later or a decade later
The UEFI 9/11 - Part VII - This Coming Week Many PCs Will Refuse to Boot "Linux" (Because of Microsoft's Expired Certificate)
The real solution is, disable "secure boot" or "SecureBoot" while it's still possible. [...] Just like submarine patents, a lot of this problem was "hibernating" for a while
The Thing Nobody in Red Hat Wants to Talk About Openly
There is a real sentiment or worry among Red Hatters, Europeans and Americans in particulars (because of higher salary expectations)
Slopwatch: Small Parade of Fake News About "Linux" and Scams Borrowing the Name (or Word) "Linux"
In practice, LLMs are a risk
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, September 05, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, September 05, 2025
Genini Links 05/09/2025: Community, ROOPHLOCH, and PITkit
Links for the day
Links 05/09/2025: Vaccine Sceptics Poison the Well, Two Exploited Vulnerabilities Patched in Android
Links for the day
Gemini Links 05/09/2025: Logitech Lift and DIY Gemini Servers
Links for the day
Links 05/09/2025: Sainsbury's Caught Spying on In-Store Shoppers and Microsoft "OpenAI is Using Legal Threats to Harass its Critics"
Links for the day
BASIC Predates Microsoft by Over a Decade, Microsoft-Controlled Sites Like The Register MS Don't Want You to Know This
The state of the media is really bad when it relies a lot on oligarchs' money and is appointing editors who are working for oligarchs
Brian Kernighan, "Only Third to Dennis Richie and Ken Thompson" (UNIX), Agreed With Someone Who Said Rust Was Just Hype, Should Not Replace C
17 hours ago
Reminder: Microsoft's "Secure Boot" Certificate for "Linux" Will be Expired in One Week
Many PCs won't manage to 'rotate' to another certificate
"Many of the Red Hat Employees Are Still Looking for Work"
Shame on IBM's CEO
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, September 04, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, September 04, 2025
Microsoft Started With Code Literally From The Trash, Nothing Has Improved Since
The reality is, there are systems and code that are reliable. But they're not Microsoft's.
Hypothesis That New McKinsey/Microsoft Executive Inside Red Hat Will Outsource Research and Development Operations to India (Like They Do in IBM)
IBM is floundering
Slopwatch: Scams, Fake Articles About "Linux", Plagiarism, and Worse
Perhaps some time soon the LLMs or the "Big LLMs" will run out of money (to borrow) and go offline, leaving those slopfarms in a tough place
Gemini Links 04/09/2025: Means of Production and Rusting Out
Links for the day
Links 04/09/2025: Science, Hardware, and Eyes on China
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/09/2025: Digital Minimalism and Social Control Media
Links for the day
IBM's GNU/Linux Divestment, Based on Hard But Anecdotal Evidence (IBM Fails to Recognise How Much Money It Made and Can Still Make From "Linux")
Love us or hate us, a lot of what we've been saying about Red Hat under IBM turns out to be rather accurate
Links 04/09/2025: Massive Microsoft Staff Cuts (Barely Reported), "Strange Conspiracy Theory Is Reportedly Spreading Inside OpenAI"
Links for the day
Activists Can Win, But Keep an Eye on the Ball and on the Trophy
GitHub is dying, it was a loss-making trap, not free hosting
Gemini Links 04/09/2025: Katrina Remembered, Distracted Driving, and Virtual Economics
Links for the day
At This Point It's No Longer Matthew Garrett But People Who Fund Matthew Garrett (or Companies That Fund His SLAPPs Against My Wife and I)
The only thing worse than misogynists are misogynists who fail to respect other people's right to go on holiday
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, September 03, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, September 03, 2025
The UEFI 9/11 - Part VI - This Serious Harm Was Planned for Over a Decade, Not an Accident or Merely Some Misfortune
The term "Serious Harm" is legally meaningful here
GNOME Unfit for Diversity and Inclusion
GNOME's leadership is using "bad words"
Brodie Robertson Addressing the Recently-Discovered Comments
Most people probably knew nothing about this until he wrote a response
Red Hat QA Team "Had Shrunk by Half Over the Past Year." (After IBM Divestment)
If Red Hat's workforce is being moved to the East, then RHEL can become a national security problem
Slopwatch: "Open Source" and "Linux" News Faked, Made by Bots and Entered Into Google News
Spam combined with slop about "Linux" has entered Google News