Comments on: Microsoft acquires equity stake in Facebook, expands ad partnership
A $240 million ante means a bigger piece of the action at the hot social networking site. It's all about the ads, Redmond says.
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Remember Microsoft also paid SCO 60M to go after Novell, IBM, and RedHat for Linux copyrights? SCO is now out of business.
Microsoft is good at duplicating innovative software that others create and which has an application on the desktop: from windows, IE to NT, winamp, frontpage, et al. But it has shown a singular lack of ability in innovating new products and properties on its own.
Way to go Gates. Let the clueless run the company and it is doomed as it lately seems to be.
For some reason this sounds like Sony?
Couldn't Microsoft do anything more original with the money?
Like maybe donate it to the Gate's Foundation, or dare I say put
all of it into research & development? Their making ridiculous
foolhardy decisions based on popularity and passing fads which
could soon turn sour, especially in their hands.
It's as if, their in highschool trying to look for a date for the
prom. But instead of doing the hardwork themselves, they
chicken out at the last minute and opt. at buying themselves a
trophy date. Sure the girl is hot, but at the end of the day
Microsoft still looks like a geek.
But the minute they tie-in WMV, WMA or any other BS MS
proprietary format not to mention the ZUNE Marketplace or
exhibit any monopolistic behavior will be the day I say good-bye
to Facebook.
for years, yes before there was myspace and facebook, they had been working on networking sites. they did the work they just missed the boat.
now they are buying it.. i dont see what is wrong with this other than good business sense.
It's such a great resource beyond what most people on here laugh at about social networks. I spent half of my college career without facebook and half with it, and I cannot tell you how much more efficient life in general became once the site went mainstream. Communication and collaboration on a platform that everyone can easily access from anywhere without clutter or fear of any kind of spam is what makes this unique and appealing. It's not at its peak, believe me. I do think they went the wrong direction when they opened it up to "regions," but there are limitless possibilities for facebook in the education realm.
As for Microsoft... eh... who cares? They're going to try to advertise. Big deal. We'll see if it works for 'em. I doubt they have the creativity and innovation it takes to impact the educated, 20something market that facebook has wrapped around its finger.
Japanese give us Prius that gets 60 Miles per Gallon and looks & feels great and for which we gladly pay $20000+
French give us Luxury Airliner and TGV that travels center city to center city carrying people in comfort & speed.
What do we get from USA (Silicon Valley), another Useless Junky Big Media Hyped free Web service.
I mean for goodness sake, WHAT IS new & innovative about this Junk Facebook?
What does it offer to the users that has not been available through 100s of different sources/services?
NOTHING.
What does it offer to Advertisers that makes Advertising on it a good/better deal?
NOTHING.
Now if you want a Web service that is actually innovative & useful for end users and Advertisers
try this search engine called Anoox, which by definition means it does not come out of Silicon Valley and is not Hyped by Big US Media. It is innovative & useful because its search results are generated democratically by us "The People", and it is operated on a "not-profit-motivated" basis so cost of Advertising on it is much lower.
can hope that Microsoft has no stake in any of the 'personal
data' that Facebook holds. We'll see if I delete my profile or not,
depending on how this deal affects the service Facebook
provides. My real problem is that the only viable alternative is
MySpace, owned by News Corp. It's like being stuck between a
rock and a hard place... I would leave the online social
networking game all together if it wasn't for keeping in contact
with all my old friends from College... sigh.
- PERCEPTION: Only Diabolical Intent on MSFT's Part
- by Sumatra-Bosch October 28, 2007 9:29 AM PDT
- Everyone I talk to about it is abandoning FaceBook on the assumption that MSFT will turn it into a fish barrel, selling off every preference, data point or click to one marketer or another.
- Like this Reply to this comment
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(23 Comments)There's got to be a name for this effect: MSFT buys something and the company's reputation as a rapacious cult of back-stabbing liars and vile opportunists completely guts the value of the company as employees and customers rush for the door.