Life officially 100% sucks for Yahoo right now. Microsoft decided to back out from buying Yahoo. Guess what happened. The stockholders decided to give Yahoo a good swift kick in the ass, i.e. the stocks dived and dived hard.

As far as Microsoft is concerned, their stocks actually edged up.

Will Yahoo recover from this? Unknown at this point; it depends what they decide to do next.

If you are a Yahoo user (and that includes Flickr users by the way,) you might want to consider backing up your stuff locally to your computer. Just a word to the wise. It’s smart to do it anyway even if Yahoo was doing well.

[Source: The New York Times]

Damn. Whoah. And at the same time, yeah.

This is how I reacted when I saw a story which cites a pair of Gartner analysts saying that Windows is “collapsing”. They go on to say that the situation is “untenable” and that Microsoft must make radical changes to the OS or risk becoming old news.

According to the story on ComputerWorld:

In a presentation at a Gartner-sponsored conference in Las Vegas, analysts Michael Silver and Neil MacDonald said Microsoft has not responded to the market, is overburdened by nearly two decades of legacy code and decisions, and faces serious competition on a whole host of fronts that will make Windows moot unless the software developer acts.

Speaking for myself, I have been THOROUGHLY disabused by the Windows Vista fiasco, so much so that I abandoned Windows altogether and am now using all OS X on 3 different Macs. Sure, I still use Windows in a virtual session, but it is XP. What Vista showed me is that Microsoft just doesn’t get it. Vista is a bloated piece of crap, and the Gartner guys correctly point out that it is weighed down by nearly two decades of legacy code.

Microsoft - STOP the legacy support! It will be the death of Windows. Seriously, are they going to release Windows 7 in 2010 and still attempt to support hardware that is 10+ years old?

Microsoft is obviously trying to make Windows all things to everybody, and in the process they are making it too little for almost everybody.

Andy Beal, from Marketing Pilgrim, makes a great point: Is Microsoft Rushing to Acquire Yahoo Before Windows Shatters? Even Arrington over at Techcrunch is echoing this point, saying THIS is why the MicroHoo deal needs to happen. The question is this: If Microsoft loses it’s grip over the desktop environment, do they then need to position themselves quickly to be a leader in the online environment?

And Microsoft hasn’t exactly been a leader online. They are a reactionary company. They see somebody else doing well in a market and they devise a way to take over. Perhaps the Yahoo deal is just Microsoft being Microsoft. Can’t beat ‘em - BUY THEM!

My only hope here is that the Microsoft culture does not kill off what we like about Yahoo. The two companies have very different cultures, and I’m really failing to see exactly how Microsoft fits into the equation - except for the fact that they are just rushing to stay relevant in a computing world shifting increasingly to the Internet.

(For those unfamiliar with the term pwned: a definition)

Make no mistake, Microsoft is a business first before anything else; a very aggressive one. In no uncertain terms they’ve basically said “Yahoo, we tried to play nice, but like it or not you’re going under our flag. Prepare to be boarded. Yours truly, -Steve B.”

The deadline is April 26.

What does this mean to you?

To be honest, not much.

The first reaction by dedicated users of Yahoo! service (notably Flickr users) is that Microsoft is going to butt their noses into something otherwise good and wreck it.

If anything, the technologies acquired thru a Yahoo! acquisition would improve existing services.

The first thing you’ll probably see is easier integration of stuff you already use in Yahoo! into the Windows operating system.

The second thing will be something you don’t see; a protection of the Yahoo! brand. Could you imagine the internet without Yahoo? Probably not. But the acquisition would ensure the brand would stick around for years to come.

It’s my opinion that an MS acquisition doesn’t spell out doom and despair for Yahoo! users as some think it might.

Also something to bear in mind: Flickr wasn’t a Yahoo! invention. Rather it was an acquisition by Yahoo into their existing services.

[Source: SearchEngineWatch]