Microsoft – “no reason to raise Yahoo bid”

 

Microsoft Corp sees no reason to increase its bid for Yahoo Inc , two months after it made a $44.6 billion offer to buy the Internet company, people familiar with Microsoft’s plans said on Monday.

“Why would Microsoft bid against themselves? The company sees no reason to bid against itself,” one of the people said.

The people requested anonymity because they are not authorized to speak on behalf of the company.

A Yahoo spokeswoman declined to comment.

Microsoft and Yahoo executives have met once to discuss a potential merger since Microsoft made its $31-a-share for Yahoo on January 31, other sources told Reuters earlier.

Although some technology blogs have speculated that Microsoft is planning to raise its bid, one person familiar with the company’s plans said Microsoft does not feel the need to pay more because no viable strategic alternatives have emerged.

Yahoo Acquires Box.net, set to replace aging briefcase

Box.net, a web based online storage company, has been acquired by Yahoo in the 10 million range,  in Y! stock. Sources at Yahoo say they have been pressured by board members to replace Yahoo Briefcase among concerns that competitors such as Microsoft’s Skydrive (5gb free storage) and Google’s rumored GDrive would make Yahoo obsolete without a serious offering. Not exactly the best outcome for Box.net, once a hailed service from Techcrunch and popular amongst bloggers.

Box is a great little site, and one can only hope that this integration allows for a seamless Yahoo experience, accessing flickr, Y! 360 blog and other Yahoo files all in one account. With Yahoo’s resources, perhaps Box will be able to offer more than 1gb of storage, making them competitive to Microsoft.

Yahoo Puts the Shine On

Jason Calacanis has an interesting take on Yahoo’s latest launch, an online women’s magazine dubbed “Shine” that was covered earlier today. In Calacanis’ opinion, Shine competes directly with the some of the same web sites that Yahoo partners with in its Yahoo Publisher Network, the company’s competitor to Google AdSense. The summation of his argument:

“If I was running a women’s site today I would make a point of puling everything I have off of Yahoo and building a voting block of women’s sites to do the same. If Yahoo wants to go “winner take all” that’s their right, but the niche content sites should stand up for themselves and vote with their partnership dollars for a true partner who doesn’t run off with your business in the night.”

Of course, Shine is far from Yahoo’s first foray into the content business – the company has run popular content sites in news, sports, finance and dozens of other categories for more than a decade. On the other hand, Google runs only a handful of sites that could be considered content (though as Calacanis notes, the yet-to-launch Knol product would mark a major shift in that strategy). Meanwhile, there are plenty of choices for publishers that would prefer their ad network not compete with them in any way – AdBrite, Kanoodle, and Miva come immediately to mind.

Yahoogle, Releases Search Video Ads

Google debuted its video ads in search results earlier this week, and Yahoo has been quick to follow suit. Elinor Mills over at CNet has spotted the video ads appearing in Yahoo search results today, and unlike Google’s video ads, the Yahoo video ads search results have been far easier to reproduce.

Try a “Special K” search, and you’ll likely see a Partner ad result appear at the top of the page. There’s a small thumbnail for the video ad, with an enticing little green button, with overlay text that reads “play video.”

What happens next will surely be the biggest point of debate between Yahoo and Google search video ad pundits for weeks to come. Once you click on the Yahoo video ad, you’ll actually get a disturbingly large video that pops up in the center of your screen, graying out all other options for web navigation.

While the majority of web searchers will see this as a mere video that’s presented as an option for partner search results, those of us that are more heavily involved with search and web browsing will see it for what it is: a commercial. At least Google’s video ads come under the text option of “watch commercial” instead of Yahoo’s “play video.” And while I do find Yahoo’s thumbnail placement to be better for attention-grabbing purposes, the non-intrusive nature of Google’s drop-down video is more appealing of an experience.

I’m sure there will be a great many video advertising options in months to come, which will incorporate more than branded commercials, and eventually present additional monetization for the online video industry. But for now, the video ads don’t really do much for me.

Yahoo Messenger For Mac, Nice.

Mac users have been conversing with distant associates via VoIP services for quite a while now. They’ve been making and receiving calls for a number of years with programs like Apple’s own iChat utility or third-party options like Skype and Project Gizmo. So it’s not particularly groundbreaking to hear of some name, upgraded for modern IP telephornication. Or whatever the kids do these days with free or ultra-cheap Web-based voice services these days. Nevertheless, when a stalwart of the IM world like Yahoo makes a belated entrance into the VoIP world with a development for the segment of PC owners who live inside the Mac OS X universe, we imagine it’s only appropriate to offer a comment on the news. Considering how large the membership of Yahoo Messenger is around the globe, it seems worthwhile to mention such a launch, right? Right.

Okay, so, the facts. The new beta of Yahoo Messenger for Mac offers a few nice features that devotees to Big Y would find quite attractive when coming off its predecessor. Users now can organize multiple chat windows through a tabbed browsing system. Also, Mac users get access to chat rooms which only Windows users were previously given entry. A new message archiving feature allows you to auto-save text-based conversation for future reference if need be. Webcam access is now an available option. IM “conferences” can be arranged. And, last but not least, file transfers with fellow Yahoo Messenger contacts of sizes up to 2GB.

Yahoo Messenger for Mac is quite like its more veteran market competitors. Users can make PC-to-PC calls as well as pay small fees to use a Phone Out account. Phone In is another option available to Messenger users, which provides you with a phone number to which non-Messenger landlines or mobile contacts can connect with. Skype has presented such services nearly from its earliest beginnings, of course, so there’s nothing particularly special or unique with Yahoo’s release. But given Yahoo’s market share in the IM space, chances are that the Sunnyvale-based company will get hold of