3 ms·

I'll be delighted! Combining Yahoo's high traffic with Microsoft's reasonably good ad management system would finally produce a competitor to Google Adwords (a

I'll be delighted! Combining Yahoo's high traffic with Microsoft's reasonably good ad management system would finally produce a competitor to Google Adwords (as outlined here a few days back: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=154184 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=154184 ) Microsoft hasn't been able to build Live.com traffic and Yahoo is clueless when it comes to building a useful ad management system. Putting the two together should resolve both problems reasonably quickly.

gruseom 19y ago
Microsoft sucks at the one and Yahoo at the other, but the two together should be good at both?
- tom_rath 19y ago
  Yes. Yahoo has been able to generate great amounts of traffic to their site, but their ability to 'monetize' it has been abysmal. They treat their free-for-use visitors wonderfully, but treat their paying customers (the advertisers) like crap. Microsoft, for all gripes against it, knows how to build a decent ad management system and assist their customers (the advertisers). From my own perspective as an advertiser, their ad management system, customer relations, etc. are far and away superior to those provided by Yahoo. If you keep Yahoo's content and rip out its horrible ad system, you'll have a winner.
  - gruseom 19y ago
    Mergers and acquisitions usually don't work out as planned, especially when the companies have very different cultures (which is nearly always). Your assumption -- that they succeed in combining the best of both businesses -- is more of a best-case scenario for MS.
aristus 19y ago
I doubt very much that it will go well. I used to work for a small Overture-like search marketing company. We were purchased by Yahoo about the same time Overture was. Overture's bosses took over that end of the business, to the extent that we were given @overture.com email addresses. Then they sucked away a large percentage of developer resources for years to do their total rewrite called Panama, adding features we'd had in Brasil (Brasil!) for years. Our code got drowned in the bathtub, except in the countries and languages that OVT couldn't bother to support. So there's an example where better code and cheaper infrastructure, already in hand and ready to go, lost out to Overture. So you think Microsoft will fare any better with that maligant tumor? MSFT's tech is nice, but it's not (repeat NOT) ready for anything other than US English + Europe. It's a disaster in the making.
- tom_rath 19y ago
  Yes, I think Microsoft will excise that 'malignant tumor' completely. Why would MSFT keep it? They want Yahoo's traffic (and all the bright, shiny bits everyone is worried will be destroyed), not Yahoo's failed business model implementation.
  - aristus 19y ago
    There's a good chance MSFT would want to excise it. I doubt their ability to do it, politically. OVT is entrenched. Too many high-up people (including Jerry!) would have to admit they were absolutely wrong and let an acquired company take control of the cashflow.

gruseom 19y ago

Microsoft sucks at the one and Yahoo at the other, but the two together should be good at both?

tom_rath 19y ago
Yes. Yahoo has been able to generate great amounts of traffic to their site, but their ability to 'monetize' it has been abysmal. They treat their free-for-use visitors wonderfully, but treat their paying customers (the advertisers) like crap. Microsoft, for all gripes against it, knows how to build a decent ad management system and assist their customers (the advertisers). From my own perspective as an advertiser, their ad management system, customer relations, etc. are far and away superior to those provided by Yahoo. If you keep Yahoo's content and rip out its horrible ad system, you'll have a winner.
- gruseom 19y ago
  Mergers and acquisitions usually don't work out as planned, especially when the companies have very different cultures (which is nearly always). Your assumption -- that they succeed in combining the best of both businesses -- is more of a best-case scenario for MS.

aristus 19y ago

I doubt very much that it will go well. I used to work for a small Overture-like search marketing company. We were purchased by Yahoo about the same time Overture was. Overture's bosses took over that end of the business, to the extent that we were given @overture.com email addresses. Then they sucked away a large percentage of developer resources for years to do their total rewrite called Panama, adding features we'd had in Brasil (Brasil!) for years. Our code got drowned in the bathtub, except in the countries and languages that OVT couldn't bother to support. So there's an example where better code and cheaper infrastructure, already in hand and ready to go, lost out to Overture. So you think Microsoft will fare any better with that maligant tumor? MSFT's tech is nice, but it's not (repeat NOT) ready for anything other than US English + Europe. It's a disaster in the making.

tom_rath 19y ago
Yes, I think Microsoft will excise that 'malignant tumor' completely. Why would MSFT keep it? They want Yahoo's traffic (and all the bright, shiny bits everyone is worried will be destroyed), not Yahoo's failed business model implementation.
- aristus 19y ago
  There's a good chance MSFT would want to excise it. I doubt their ability to do it, politically. OVT is entrenched. Too many high-up people (including Jerry!) would have to admit they were absolutely wrong and let an acquired company take control of the cashflow.