MICROSOFT'S robbery of Yahoo! [1, 2] has probably erased a lot of history relating to this saga, which lasted a year and a half.
“A lot of people probably cannot remember that Microsoft hired AstroTurf groups such as LawMedia to battle against the Google/Yahoo! deal.”Now that we come across the spontaneous press release "Hispanic Publishers Have High Hopes for Yahoo!-Microsoft Search Advertising Partnership" it is hard not to think about the LawMedia lobby. Why issue a promotional message like that?
Microsoft is very much afraid of Google, which -- just like Free software -- challenges the underlying business model of Microsoft by taking software on-line, as opposed to setting it free. Google and Microsoft, both of which are proprietary software companies, are still competing to own the medical data of US citizens and be in charge of other companies. Neither is really acceptable (either Fog Computing or non-Free software), but Google has narrower history of breaking the law, which it never did at quite the same scale as Microsoft.
According to some new numbers, Google's brand value now significantly exceeds that of Microsoft.
Millward Brown Optimor has just published its list of its 100 most valuable global brands for 2009. Guess who topped the list?
You shouldn't have to if you're reading this blog. But yes, Google rings the bell at No. 1 with a $100 billion valuation, a 16 percent increase from a year ago. Microsoft came in second at $76.2 billion, an 8 percent jump from 2008.
FC Barcelona avoids the very appearance of endorsing Microsoft products
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Last time I checked two years ago, during a trip to the Camp Nou (when Openbravo CEO Manel Sarasa got me into the president's box), FC Barcelona was running OpenCMS for its Web site and a range of other open-source software for content management and other needs.
Perhaps FC Barcelona would have happily done a photo op with the Linux penguin, but just couldn't bear to affiliate with Clippy?
Investors: Steve Ballmer's a Failure
Roughly 40% of respondents to a "Wall Street Journal" poll aren't pleased.