SAN JOSE, Calif.--Microsoft believes it's found a way to gain an edge against Google's dominant search engine: a deeper understanding of what people are searching for and what's on Web pages.
Specifically, the company believes examining a full sequence of user queries can lead to more useful results. Today, the company only keeps track of the immediately prior search, but often users use search engines to explore subject areas broadly, said Satya Nadella, senior vice president of Microsoft's search, portal and advertising platform group, at the Search Engine Strategies conference here.
"I believe this notion of understanding user intent--being able to analyze (search queries) and come up with search patterns and use them to shape the search experience--is one of the most important areas for us," Nadella said.
Many searches are quick operations to get to a specific site, but Microsoft is eying the in-depth operation search has become for many. Half of search queries at Microsoft's search site are part of a 30-minute session spent searching and checking Web sites, and at some point in that half-hour span Microsoft should be able to depart from "one-size-fits-all" search results to a more carefully tailored response, he said.
Of course, that kind of deeper analysis of people's search behavior--which presumably could be accompanied by more carefully targeted and perhaps higher-priced advertisements--could also raise hackles. Basing search ads on a few keywords typed into a search engine is less intrusive than basing them on an entire history of online behavior. Behavioral targeting of ads, though a concept that covers a broad spectrum of possibilities, is under increasing scrutiny.
Satya Nadella, senior vice president of Microsoft's search, portal and advertising platform group
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET News)Microsoft, which trails leader Google and second-place Yahoo, was thwarted in its effort to get ahead in the search market by acquiring either all of Yahoo or just its search assets. But Nadella takes the long view, arguing Microsoft only started its online search effort in earnest four and a half years ago. The Redmond, Wash.-based company will keep plugging away, trying to take advantage of "inflection points" where search technology changes significantly, he added.
"If we come again and again with innovation that matters, we will have the opportunity to grow our volume and our share," Nadella said. "We made decent progress but we have a ways to go."
A long way indeed. In a meeting with reporters, Nadella said he wasn't happy with Microsoft's share of search queries that's less than 10 percent. And upper management's deep interest in better results is evident not just from the Yahoo acquisition turmoil but from the company's successful acquisition of Powerset, a search start-up banking on natural language processing as a way to better understand Web page content and search queries.
"Bill has definitely not retired for us," said Scott Prevost, Powerset's general manager and product director, referring to Chairman Bill Gates' move to part-time work at Microsoft. Prevost also spoke during the meeting with reporters.
Powerset figures prominently in Microsoft's search work. The start-up's technology only made it as far as indexing and searching Wikipedia, but results, even from that relatively narrow domain, will be used to augment Microsoft's search results, Nadella said.
"You'll see us integrating that with Wikipedia articles," he said.
The Powerset technology can be used to better understand people's search queries and the Web pages that Microsoft's search engine indexes, Nadella added. "We think that tech, natural-language processing, is going to be a very critical way for us to improve relevance further, at scale," he said.
Google is of course a formidable competitor with a massive and fast-moving research effort. And while it may design its search engine for the broadest use possible, it certainly can take a user's search history into account. The optional Web History feature can adjust search results according to users' earlier practices. However, Udi Manber, head of Google's search quality work, said earlier this year that personalization has only a minor effect on the ordering of search results.
Microsoft has other ways it hopes to diverge from the one-size-fits-all approach. For example, Nadella said the company also hopes to redirect the search experience away from a generic interface depending on subcategories people are using, Nadella said, pointing to travel, health, images, and video. "These are the domains where we have domain-specific task-oriented" interfaces, he said.
The company also has ambitions for changing the business behind search, he said, pointing as one example to the Microsoft Live Cashback program, which converts the fees that search advertisers pay to Microsoft into rebates for people who buy products through the search mechanism.
Another business change coming for the search industry overall is the move toward more sophisticated payment schemes. Currently, advertisers pay search engines for ads when searchers click those ads, a model called cost per click (CPC), but the payment model will shifting toward cost per action (CPA), Nadella predicted. CPA requires more activity on the part of a searcher--registering for a service or buying a product, for example--before payment is made.
"CPC is fantastic. It will remain. But there will be additional things (such as) CPA," Nadella said. "We think that will bring next level of efficiency to the search marketplace. We're very bullish about that."
Flickr co-founder Stewart Butterfield, who has just left Yahoo, has some less-than-adulatory remarks about his former masters.
Speaking to CNET sister publication ZDnet during an Australian visit, Butterfield said he would have preferred it if Microsoft's attempt to acquire Yahoo had gone ahead.
"It was not so great," Butterfield said of the Microsoft acquisition saga. "Once the ball was rolling I would have rather seen the acquisition happen. I think a lot of damage was done to Yahoo. Not only from a company perspective, but from a leadership and (morale) perspective."
Butterfield left Yahoo July 12, and fellow co-founder Caterina Fake left a few weeks earlier, part of an executive exodus from the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company.
He also criticized Yahoo for being concerned about quarterly results at the expense of longer-term, riskier investments.
"I felt like the biggest problem while I was there (was that) that management was oriented a little bit too much towards the quarterly results...If the entire focus of the company is produce a certain amount of operating free cash flow or a certain amount of capital expenditure...it isn't hard for other people to out-maneuver you, when they're not so concerned about those things," he said. "I am sure the management at Google, despite their outward proclamations, are every bit as concerned about those numbers, but they are taking bigger strategic risks, and other Web start-ups are as well."
As expected (see previous reports), Microsoft scooped up Powerset to buttress its search efforts.
Barney Pell, Powerset co-founder and CTO
(Credit: Dan Farber)It's not a replacement for increasing market share by acquiring Yahoo Search, but it gives Microsoft some differentiated search technology and top engineers for less than $100 million. Ramez Naam, group program manager of Live Search, said the Powersoft negotiations happened in parallel with the Yahoo talks over the last few months. Google and Yahoo may also have been interested in Powerset, but no one is talking.
Whether Microsoft can leapfrog Google over the long term with this semantic engine remains to be seen.
Powerset had done a good job of creating a rich semantic layer on top of Wikipedia, but bringing natural language and slick semantic-based interfaces to the entire Web is a long-term and very costly endeavor.
"With an existing search infrastructure, incredible capital resources, unlimited data, a leading search team, and clear mission to revolutionize the search landscape, Microsoft can rapidly accelerate our progress in building semantic search technology and bringing it to full Web scale," Powerset's Mark Johnson said in a blog post about the acquisition.
Powerset can provide direct answers to queries from its Wikipedia and Freebase index and highlight the most relevant search results based on the meaning of the query.
According to a blog post from Satya Nadella, Microsoft's senior vice president of Search, Portal, and Advertising, Powerset's engineers will join the Search Relevance team and remain in San Francisco.
Back to the leapfrogging Google question. Much of what Powerset has enabled with its technology is a superior user experience for searching. Powerset's Wikipedia search, which surfaces concepts, meanings, and relationships (like subject, verbs, and objects in a language), is the very small tip of the iceberg.
If Microsoft can succeed in extending Powerset's technology to key parts of the Web corpus, Google will have to figure out a way to match the quality and user experience. And, there is little doubt that if Google decided that what Powerset and Microsoft are doing as one is important, the company dedicated to dominating search through its engineering prowess will circle the wagons.
A few months ago, Powerset co-founder and CTO Barney Pell told me that his start-up company's software was a first step in changing the way users search and consume Web content. "It's a complete shift. You see this and you want to experience all content in this way. And, as an introduction, it will drive huge investment in semantic and linguistic technology, just as investments were made in information retrieval and scalable databases in the past," he said.
During a conversation after the announcement, Pell told me, "Natural language search will be the center of innovation for the next 20 years." It will likely take 20 years to engineer the semantic, natural language Web that Tim Berners-Lee envisioned in his 2001 essay in Scientific American.
Voluntarily or not, it looks like Yahoo will be getting a lot less top-heavy.
The pioneering but troubled Internet company is headed for a reorganization that, combined with an exodus of top Yahoo executives, will in all likelihood put power in dramatically fewer hands.
A lean management structure can be good for building a nimble, responsive organization. The problem with that idea at Yahoo is that the company is losing many of the executives who have control over day-to-day operations.
Ash Patel
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET News.com)And in some cases, the departures spread multiple steps down the hierarchy, depriving Yahoo of talent to promote and of expertise to train any new arrivals. Major turnover on this scale can turn succession planning into improv theater.
It appears the executive departures and an imminent reorganization are inextricably linked. From our discussions with Yahoo insiders and people familiar with the matter, it appears some executives want to leave, which means some reorganization is inevitable, while others aren't happy with just how that reorg appears to be shaking out.
To recap our and others' coverage, here's where Yahoo's upper echelon appears headed. First, the exodus:
Last week, two executive vice presidents--Jeff Weiner of the network group, and Usama Fayyad of research and computing infrastructure--said they'd be leaving. A third EVP, Qi Lu, in charge of search and monetization, joined the list this week. Two senior vice presidents also are departing, Brad Garlinghouse of communication and communities, and Vish Makhijani of search.
Second, what comes next? The reorg, as we reported Thursday. Some details on the possibilities have emerged. President Sue Decker is leading the revamp, according to the Wall Street Journal and others.
Patel, Schneider ascendant
Ash Patel--one of the company's earliest engineers and a man who still enjoys talking with programmers--looks to be ascendant overall by leading a new Yahoo products group. That would include areas such as search, Yahoo Messenger, Flickr, and Yahoo Mail.
Currently, Patel is EVP of platforms and infrastructure. That may sound like a behind-the-scenes infrastructure job, but a big part of the company's turnaround plan is the Yahoo Open Strategy, a plan to expose Yahoo's inner workings to outside programmers, and that's Patel's domain.
But should an engineer run all of the products group? Kara Swisher at AllThingsD believes the prospect of reporting to Patel is what was behind the Garlinghouse and Makhijani disgruntlement.
We're also hearing word of a regional organization for other areas, and Swisher reports that Hilary Schneider will oversee the U.S. operations involving advertising and media. She's currently EVP of global partner solutions, where she signs up display advertisers among other things. In the new order, she'll be Patel's peer and will report to Decker.
As for the other regions, Toby Coppel will run Europe, Rose Tsou will run Asia, and Keith Nilsson will run emerging markets, Swisher said.
CTO Ari Balogh will absorb some of Lu's engineering team, Swisher also said. One source we spoke to wasn't optimistic about that arena, believing that Yahoo needs a technology leader who's a young Turk rather than someone from the old guard--VeriSign in Balogh's case.
_290x313.jpg)
Hilary Schneider
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET News.com)
A fresh start?
It's apparent from assorted insiders that there's worry about Yahoo brain drain.
But would that necessarily be a bad thing?
Yahoo remains a powerful Internet property, but much of the initiative has shifted to Google when it comes to online innovation. Google found a way to make search ads immensely profitable, is expanding aggressively into many traditional portal activities such as e-mail, and is pushing cloud computing technology with Google Apps.
So, for all the current executives' accomplishments, Yahoo has yet to match Google's overall ascent. Perhaps it's a good time for fresh faces. Corporate turmoil, like war, can quickly promote a captain into a colonel.
Freshness will go only so far, though: the two at the top, CEO Jerry Yang and Decker, are committed to Yahoo "for the long haul," I hear.
I'm not convinced the pair's abilities are in a dramatically different league from most CEOs, but they are suffering under an unusually intense spotlight. Yahoo's bruising battle with Microsoft, replaced now with a bruising battle with billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn, exposed Yahoo vulnerabilities and simultaneously gave shareholders a taste of Yahoo stock above $29.
Even though Icahn was trying to push the now seemingly doomed Microsoft acquisition, he hasn't gone away. He's expected to propose an alternative board of directors soon in anticipation of the company's August 1 shareholder meeting.
CNET News.com Editor in Chief Dan Farber believes Wall Street will effectively oust Yang and that Decker is the likely successor. I'm not willing to make that pronouncement yet, but certainly one challenge at the company, putting several individually strong properties together into a coherent whole, is a task for high-level management.
Wall Street seems mildly pessimistic about the changes so far, though not as much as when the possibility of a Yahoo-Microsoft partnership fell off the table. The company's stock gradually slid over the week from about $23 to about $22. What it does after the reorg and Carl Icahn could determine Yang's fate.
Microsoft, we get it: That Yahoo thing fell through, and picking up the pieces can be messy. But according to Kara Swisher at All Things D, Redmond just won't give up. The company has reportedly put together a Plan B that it refers to as "Project Granola," a name that makes "Zune" sound good.
And part of "Project Granola," Swisher wrote, is exploring the possibility of turning that $240 million stake in Facebook into an outright ownership.
More specifically, Microsoft's bankers have been shooting "subtle signals" in Facebook's direction, without expecting much of an outcome. "We just want to gauge their interest, more than any real effort," a shadowy financial type told Swisher, adding that he or she doesn't think Facebook will budge from its desire to eventually go public.
But the ultimate goal for Microsoft might be just to acquire some hot Web 2.0 names, not necessarily Facebook. In that case, the likes of Digg or LinkedIn might satisfy Steve Ballmer's appetite.
Just remember to have some plain yogurt with that granola, Ballmer. It tastes better if you keep it simple.
Yahoo laid out its golden parachute plans for all of its full-time employees Tuesday, in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The filing outlines two change-in-control severance plans, should the Internet search pioneer find itself under new ownership, aka Microsoft.
Yahoo, which is facing an unsolicited buyout bid from Microsoft, will offer both full-time employees and executives anywhere from four months to two years of severance pay, depending on their job title.
The parachute, or cushion, will kick into effect should that employee lose his job within two years after a new owner takes over, should she get terminated without cause, or if the employee decides it's time to leave for "good reason."
Jerry Yang, Yahoo chief executive and co-founder, is also eligible for the severance package. But for Yang, his golden parachute would only net him $2 at the most, given he only earns an annual salary of $1, according to PaidContent.
Yahoo said the severance packages are designed to accomplish several things: "help retain the employees, help maintain a stable work environment and provide certain economic benefits to the employees in the event their employment is terminated (under certain circumstances)."
The golden parachute also includes health and dental coverage for the length of employees' severance awards, as well as reimbursement of outplacement services up to two years, or a maximum of $15,000, depending on job title.
This bodes well for both Yahoo and Microsoft. Yahoo wants to retain its workforce, whether it prevails over any hostile takeover attempt, or whether it walks down the aisle to a friendly merger with a desired suitor.
Microsoft, as well, would hope to retain key Yahoo employees to aid the software giant in any integration plans.
This "Blue-Pink Screen of Death" image protests Microsoft's attempted acquisition of Yahoo, which operates Flickr.
(Credit: Flickr user michaeluyttersp)This is what happens when Microsoft tries to take over not just a company but also a community: a number of Flickr users have launched a group opposing the attempted acquisition.
The Microsoft: Keep Your Evil Grubby Hands Off Our Flickr group has 1,804 members and counting. The photo-sharing site has no shortage of opinionated members, and who knows how many shares they'll be able to vote in a proxy fight, but it is an interesting development.
"I'm not a Microsoft hater," said Flickr user Christopher Bosum. "I just don't like the fact that there might be just another Internet monopolist."
Several of the photos in the pool are amusing, but I particularly liked the Blue-Pink Screen of Death that merges Flickr's color scheme with Microsoft's notorious error fatal-crash message.
Microsoft made an unsolicited $44.6 billion offer for Yahoo last week. Yahoo has said its board is studying the offer.
Social networking is one of the biggest and fastest-evolving phenomena on the Web, and Microsoft's proposed takeover of Yahoo will undoubtedly send it in new directions. More than anything, a MSFT-YHOO acquisition will shake up the debate over just how you can make money off a Facebook or MySpace.com--because they're running out of time to figure that out.
Should the Microsoft-Yahoo acquisition go through, expect them to try to corner the social-network advertising market.
The common wisdom is that neither Microsoft nor Yahoo is a real force in social networking. Both companies own multiple social media properties, and the only resounding success among them is Yahoo's Flickr. (Sorry, Microsoft, I'm not counting the Zune's "song-squirting.") "They're very interested in the space," Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li said in an interview with CNET News.com. "They haven't been able to get traction in it. They look at it very longingly."
Social networking, in addition, will be a tasty slice of the Web for a hypothetical Microsoft-Yahoo because it's also one of the few niches of the Web on which Google doesn't already have a stranglehold. Its OpenSocial developer initiative isn't ready yet, its Orkut social network has only gained traction in a few regions of the globe, and the company admitted in its recent quarterly earnings call that social advertising (specifically on News Corp.'s MySpace) isn't bringing home the bacon.
Taking the reins on the advertising market is probably the best way for Microsoft-Yahoo to make waves in social networking without actually launching a big social-media initiative--and I certainly hope they don't try to, because there are way too many networks out there already. Microsoft already has a foot in the door with its $240 million stake in Facebook. (Yahoo tried to acquire it outright in 2006 and was promptly spurned.) And Facebook's own Social Ads were met with high-profile opposition and plenty of bad press.
With Microsoft's and Yahoo's resources pooled, the two companies could devise a more effective social advertising strategy (if such a thing is even possible). Even if it's dubious in its effectiveness, expect it to be very high profile. Think about it: Microsoft-Yahoo could claim they're doing what Google couldn't do. How's that for instilling confidence?
"A potential acquisition, if it actually goes through, could be a much, much more interesting player for Facebook to want to do business with," Li said, noting that Facebook's current deal with Microsoft only covers display advertisements, not search ads. "If Microsoft and Yahoo can actually make a play in search, that makes Facebook a lot more comfortable going with an all-Microsoft deal and maybe even be acquired by it. Who knows?"
But beyond advertising, a combined Microsoft-Yahoo has a massive social-networking tool at its fingertips, Li continued. "Yahoo and Microsoft both have this wonderful asset called e-mail address books and instant-messaging buddy lists, which are essentially a social graph," she said. "A lot of people are using those services, much more so than Gmail, for example, and so that's an instant social graph."
On Friday, I had a brief phone interview with Kevin Johnson, president of the Microsoft division that includes Windows and Windows Live, shortly after the software giant announced its $44.6 billion bid for Yahoo. I tried to get more details on the how Microsoft plans to bridge the cultural gap between the two companies, which brands it is tied to and what it will do if Yahoo says no. Sorry, I don't have more concrete answers, but I've posted a pretty complete transcript so you can read for yourself.
Kevin Johnson
(Credit: Microsoft)
What makes you guys feel like the cultural and technical and product differences can be overcome pretty easily?
Johnson: Well, let me just start with one thing, which is, our two companies share a common passion for innovation, and the way that innovation creates new and unique user experiences, and utilizes technology to create value for consumers, for advertisers, and publishers. So we share a common passion in that particular area.
It's more than passion, though. Whenever companies--and I've covered a lot of mergers--talk about it, it's always a common passion. But, when you look at the way Microsoft and Yahoo have approached this space, it has been fairly differently.
Johnson: Yes. I think the key on this is going to be the integration approach that we use, Ina, and I think through recent experiences with Aquantive and Tellme, we know how to successfully integrate. And certainly the Microsoft and Yahoo approach, we're going to work together closely on this integration process.
We've got three things. Number one, we've got clarity of the strategic and financial synergies that we're looking to drive. We've got a very clear set of integration principles. And we're going to put together a joint team of Microsoft and Yahoo leaders to work through a thoughtful process on how to do that integration. That includes the people, that includes the services and the technology, it includes the brand, and so we're confident that that approach is one that yields success.
You guys alluded on the call that the Yahoo brand would probably play an important role. It sounded like Windows Live and Office Live would play an important role and that maybe MSN might be the brand to go. Is that a fair reading?
Johnson: Well, I'm going to defer that to the integration team that's got to work through a thoughtful process. I recognize the fact that the Yahoo brand is a strong brand, and that integration team will factor that in as they work through a thoughtful process. But it's important that to have a successful integration that you put the right set of leaders across Microsoft and Yahoo together with clear principles, and clear goals, and let them work through the specifics.
Why do you think Yahoo has been less than willing to come to the negotiating table?
Johnson: Well, look, I think we've made a great offer, and we respect the fact that their management and their board have a lot to consider, and we're looking forward to the dialogue.
Right. But I mean, obviously, if they were willing to negotiate, you guys wouldn't be going public with an offer, you'd be negotiating one. Why do you think if it's such a great offer they've not been willing to entertain it?
Johnson: I'm not going to speculate. I would suggest you certainly should talk to Yahoo. But we think we've made a great offer.
Steve Ballmer said on the call that he called Jerry Yang last night. Do you know if they spoke and at what length?
Johnson: They spoke, I don't know to what length.
Are you guys committed to this no matter what, or is there a time frame with which it's important that negotiations conclude?
Johnson: Well, look, I'll just say, we believe in this combination now more than ever, and that's why we made it public so that both sets of shareholders and employees are aware of the opportunity inherent in this combination. We've got great respect for Yahoo and their employees, and we think this combination makes not only strategic sense, but it makes good financial sense.
And in terms of sort of the momentum issue in the meantime, what are you going to try and tell your troops in the meantime? I mean, obviously, this is going to take some time to work itself out.
Johnson: Well, certainly, as I outlined at the Financial Analyst Meeting last July, we've been on a good path, a lot of progress, whether it was the release of the Windows Live Suite in November, the release in the fall of Live Search, the successful integration of Aquantive. We've signed up over 60 publishers since we announced the acquisition of Aquantive to our advertising platform. And we've got a plan of record. Our team is going to stay focused on that plan of record full speed ahead.
It does seem like there is an admission, though, in trying to combine with Yahoo that alone you guys have not been making the kind of inroads against Google. I mean, I think, if you look at search market share, other figures, it seems like that's a part of the pitch here to shareholders.
Johnson: Well, the thing I point out is the online advertising industry is growing at a rapid rate. It will be an $80 billion industry around the year 2010, and that industry has the dynamics of scale economics. It's a big engineering problem, and it requires a lot of capital and infrastructure. And because of that we think that combining these two organizations enables us to be a more credible alternative to an increasingly dominant player.
Do you have a Plan B if Yahoo ultimately says no?
Johnson: Look, we're focused on... we've made a great offer, and as they consider this we look forward to the dialogue.
When you look at the cultural differences between Microsoft and Yahoo, you don't need to look much further than a floor plan.
Microsoft has been a company of offices, where workers toil individually at their piece of a collective project. Yahoo, by contrast is a Silicon Valley archetype where workers sit in cubicles and tend to work collaboratively.
The folks in Redmond are known for being hard-charging and competitive, both internally and externally. Yahoo, meanwhile, tends to be more collaborative, sometimes to the point of inefficiency.
There are philosophical differences as well. Yahoo has been a huge proponent of open source, Microsoft a reluctant one.
Differences such as these are important to consider when one is planning to fork over $44 billion. Now obviously, Microsoft faces a number of hurdles (winning approval from Yahoo's board and shareholders, gaining the antitrust OK) before it even gets to this point. But these are the kinds of challenges that Microsoft should be, and probably is, trying to solve.
In an interview, Microsoft division president Kevin Johnson talked about the common "passion for innovation" at the two companies. That's probably true, but all companies, at least all good ones, can be defined by their passion. Both companies have also been accused of suffering from an identity crisis.
Johnson said that Microsoft has learned a great deal from its acquisitions of Tellme and Aquantive, though he acknowledged the significant size difference between swallowing Yahoo and buying those smaller companies.
"Certainly the process is the same," Johnson said, "This will be a more complex integration planning effort than Tellme and Aquantive."
One of the big differences is the amount of overlap between Yahoo and Microsoft on the product side. Both companies have their own advertising platforms as well as competing home pages, instant messaging programs, e-mail programs and content sites.
Now, overlap can be both a good thing and a bad thing. On the positive side, choosing one company's technology over another allows talent to be freed up to work on other projects.
And, clearly, many of Microsoft and Yahoo's businesses would benefit from greater scale a point Johnson brought up frequently in the interview and on a conference call with financial analysts. The companies already have instant messaging that is interoperable, but a single product would doubtlessly be more attractive. In search, in ad-serving and in content, a combined company would be a larger rival to Google.
Plus, the two companies tend to be strong in different regions. In Europe, for example, Yahoo tends to be weaker and Microsoft stronger. In the U.S., the two companies tend to attract different audiences with their mail products--Yahoo Mail appealing to younger and more savvy users, while Windows Live Hotmail has strong roots as an e-mail service for non-techies.
But each time the company picks a technology to go with, it creates winners and losers and the potential for animosity builds. Microsoft was quick to say that it would be a team of people from both companies that will need to make decisions, but it also gave the strong sense that it has done significant planning work already.
The company didn't tip its hand too much, but Microsoft executives said on the call that Windows Live was an important brand, as more of the operating system's duties move online. Office Live, for similar reasons, is also important. Microsoft also praised the Yahoo brand.
"I recognize the fact the Yahoo brand is a strong brand," Johnson said in an interview, echoing comments made on the call. MSN, notably, didn't get such an endorsement.
