Those are interesting links but they don't support your assertion that Microsoft's big envy is for the kind of ad targeting data FB and google posses. The only

Those are interesting links but they don't support your assertion that Microsoft's big envy is for the kind of ad targeting data FB and google posses. The only related content I saw were the mentions of Cortana, and Cortana is not just a terrible way to chase advertising dollars, it's actually a way to unseat Google's dominance in tech precisely because it breaks the viability of advertising as a business. Google's entire business is built around selling the presentation of unwanted information around the organic content you want. That works great in a visual medium where the extra information requires no more of your time and only minimally more of your attention. Alexa and Cortana and Siri shift that interaction to audio where it becomes incredibly difficult to insert even a tiny fraction of the surrounding ad content search engines used to deliver visually. Alexa and Cortana and Siri break google's business model because they break the ability to spam customers with ancillary information, and they can do that because neither Amazon nor Apple nor Microsoft derive the bulk of their revenues from ad sales. This is a battle of business models, not a quest for the other guy's business model. So yes, Microsoft is building Cortana, and no, Cortana isn't about becoming an advertising powerhouse it's about blocking their two ad-fueled competitors (the best discussion I'm aware of of google's efforts to fight back against this agent-driven threat to their ad-based business model is [0] ) [0] https://stratechery.com/2016/google-and-the-limits-of-strategy/ https://stratechery.com/2016/google-and-the-limits-of-strate...