Comments on: Nightmare on Microsoft Street http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/ Wed, 25 Nov 2009 18:09:05 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Nightmare on Microsoft Street | MCSE Tutorials http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-4470 Nightmare on Microsoft Street | MCSE Tutorials Tue, 09 Sep 2008 11:54:41 +0000 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-4470 [...] Nightmare on Microsoft Street By Kara Swisher Imagine this: Google starts buying up a series of promising and innovative Web 2.0 companies that Microsoft is either partnered with or clearly is or should be interested in. It starts with Digg, moves onto, say, Spot Runner and others, … AllThingsDigital — Today’s Headlines - http://allthingsd.com/ [...] [...] Nightmare on Microsoft Street By Kara Swisher Imagine this: Google starts buying up a series of promising and innovative Web 2.0 companies that Microsoft is either partnered with or clearly is or should be interested in. It starts with Digg, moves onto, say, Spot Runner and others, … AllThingsDigital — Today’s Headlines – http://allthingsd.com/ [...]

]]> By: Mac Beach http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3289 Mac Beach Sun, 08 Jun 2008 21:08:55 +0000 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3289 Charlie: But that's what the Yahoo deal was all about, buying eyeballs. Not one of the apps mentioned here is rocket science. Google or Microsoft could easily write their own versions (and in some cases have) the trick is to get people to switch once they have gotten used to one thing or another. Yahoo mail stinks by comparison with, well, almost everything, but there are people who have Yahoo e-mail addresses and simply don't want to go to the trouble of notifying all their contacts of a change. Orkut will soon have caught up with Facebook in features (after inexplicably sitting on their hands for several years) but it is hard to find anyone not in India or Brazil who is interested in using it because the critical mass in USA is already using either Myspace or Facebook. Remember Microsoft's strategy when it was still a growing company was to let the applications vendors fight among themselves until there was a clear winner, at which point they would enter into NDA negotiations, make a low-ball offer for the company and if refused, copy the concepts of the target company into a new "free" bundled add-on to Windows. That's why nobody in their right mind "partners" with Microsoft. Google would do well to not copy the MS formula. On the other hand persistence can pay, if you have a better product, and Orkut, Google Groups, Gmail, Docs, all seem to work pretty well together and are each gaining users every day. They don't have a Digg clone (that I know of) but I bet they could throw one together in a few weeks if they thought they needed to. Charlie:

But that’s what the Yahoo deal was all about, buying eyeballs. Not one of the apps mentioned here is rocket science. Google or Microsoft could easily write their own versions (and in some cases have) the trick is to get people to switch once they have gotten used to one thing or another. Yahoo mail stinks by comparison with, well, almost everything, but there are people who have Yahoo e-mail addresses and simply don’t want to go to the trouble of notifying all their contacts of a change. Orkut will soon have caught up with Facebook in features (after inexplicably sitting on their hands for several years) but it is hard to find anyone not in India or Brazil who is interested in using it because the critical mass in USA is already using either Myspace or Facebook.

Remember Microsoft’s strategy when it was still a growing company was to let the applications vendors fight among themselves until there was a clear winner, at which point they would enter into NDA negotiations, make a low-ball offer for the company and if refused, copy the concepts of the target company into a new “free” bundled add-on to Windows.

That’s why nobody in their right mind “partners” with Microsoft.

Google would do well to not copy the MS formula. On the other hand persistence can pay, if you have a better product, and Orkut, Google Groups, Gmail, Docs, all seem to work pretty well together and are each gaining users every day. They don’t have a Digg clone (that I know of) but I bet they could throw one together in a few weeks if they thought they needed to.

]]> By: Charlie O'Donnell http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3288 Charlie O'Donnell Sun, 08 Jun 2008 16:42:47 +0000 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3288 Hmm... First time I've thought this, but instead of buying Yahoo!, you could probably buy up a whole bunch of little startups and essentially have Yahoo! just minus all the traffic, for a fraction of the price. Put them together nicely in a suite and maybe the traffic would come... just wonder who might attempt it first. Hmm… First time I’ve thought this, but instead of buying Yahoo!, you could probably buy up a whole bunch of little startups and essentially have Yahoo! just minus all the traffic, for a fraction of the price. Put them together nicely in a suite and maybe the traffic would come… just wonder who might attempt it first.

]]> By: Bob Warfield http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3287 Bob Warfield Sun, 08 Jun 2008 16:13:03 +0000 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3287 It's all about arbitrage. If Google and Microsoft compete for the same property, Google can afford to pay a lot more. Oracle has traded on this for some time. They can afford to pay more than SAP. See why on my blog: http://smoothspan.wordpress.com/2008/06/08/acquisition-is-about-arbitrage-and-kara-swisher-is-right/ Cheers, BW It’s all about arbitrage. If Google and Microsoft compete for the same property, Google can afford to pay a lot more.

Oracle has traded on this for some time. They can afford to pay more than SAP.

See why on my blog:

http://smoothspan.wordpress.co.....-is-right/

Cheers,

BW

]]> By: david zotter http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3285 david zotter Sun, 08 Jun 2008 16:01:40 +0000 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3285 Digg can't make MSFT cool.... Watching Digg group give out free Zunes was highly painful. It is doubtful that this does anything to make MSFT cooler, instead, it makes Kevin Rose and crew look like a bunch of sell outs. Hawking the warez of the highest bidder, not what is best of breed. Digg can’t make MSFT cool….

Watching Digg group give out free Zunes was highly painful.

It is doubtful that this does anything to make MSFT cooler, instead, it makes Kevin Rose and crew look like a bunch of sell outs. Hawking the warez of the highest bidder, not what is best of breed.

]]> By: dave mcclure http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3284 dave mcclure Sun, 08 Jun 2008 13:10:44 +0000 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3284 I agree it's interesting that eBay is rarely brought up as an acquisition target, yet has 2 very compelling assets in PayPal & Skype, as well as other smaller entities. and Amazon is also a candidate, except it would take a lot of Moolah & Mohammad to Move the Mountain known as Bezos. AWS has got big potential & has already stirred Goog to compete with App Engine. not to mention Amazon payments / 1-click buy is the only real competitor to PayPal. anyway both are quite attractive for monetization, users, cash & key assets. eBay is certainly the more labored of the two, but Bezos has more vision about where he's going (which prob means he'd turn down any suitors). I agree it’s interesting that eBay is rarely brought up as an acquisition target, yet has 2 very compelling assets in PayPal & Skype, as well as other smaller entities.

and Amazon is also a candidate, except it would take a lot of Moolah & Mohammad to Move the Mountain known as Bezos. AWS has got big potential & has already stirred Goog to compete with App Engine. not to mention Amazon payments / 1-click buy is the only real competitor to PayPal.

anyway both are quite attractive for monetization, users, cash & key assets. eBay is certainly the more labored of the two, but Bezos has more vision about where he’s going (which prob means he’d turn down any suitors).

]]> By: Prashant Singh http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3283 Prashant Singh Sun, 08 Jun 2008 09:38:07 +0000 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080608/nightmare-on-microsoft-street/#comment-3283 Spotrunner ..if scales well is a serious acquisition target for Google and MSFT both . Othere startup to watch for is Admob.com and slide but i find it rather strange that you are not thinking of a scenario where a new force might emerge . Jimmi Wales has some serious ambition with his project like Wikpedia,wikia,grubz , Facebook has already acquired Parakey , and they can easily cozy up with Powerset, slide etc [Founder Fund connection ] I think stage is set for emergence of a third force ..its not a matter of IF its a matter of When . Spotrunner ..if scales well is a serious acquisition target for Google and MSFT both . Othere startup to watch for is Admob.com
and slide

but i find it rather strange that you are not thinking of a scenario where a new force might emerge .

Jimmi Wales has some serious ambition with his project like Wikpedia,wikia,grubz ,

Facebook has already acquired Parakey , and they can easily cozy up with Powerset, slide etc [Founder Fund connection ]

I think stage is set for emergence of a third force ..its not a matter of IF its a matter of When .

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