Like news? You’ll LOVE these!
Gizmodo tests WiMax, likes it.
Hacker compromises Mac in seconds.
New features in Silverlight 3.
Sirius founder: Sirius is doomed.
Steve Ballmer’s still courting Yahoo.
Random rumor: OLED Macs, iPhones.
Dell’s Adamo notebook on sale.
iPhone tethering seems to work.
LiveSide.net has a screenshot of the home page of “Kumo,” the next-generation Microsoft search engine which is currently in internal use at the company, and which may or may not be called Kumo when it goes public. It looks a lot like the current Live Search home page, which is dominated by a big striking photograph with hotspots that take you to search results relating to the image. The LiveSide image jibes with my only personal exposure to Kumo, which happened last week when I met with a Microsoft exec who had it loaded up in his browser; there, too, it had the Live Search-style photo teaser.
We still don’t know much about Kumo, though–and with search engines even more than most things in the world of tech, it’s hard to form even preliminary impressions without a fair amount of hands-on time. The bottom line with Kumo or any other would-be Googlekiller will ultimately be whether it helps you find relevant information more quickly than Google. Which would require that it make dramatic strides over Live Search, which usually leaves me less than completely satisfied when I use it. (I’m willing to confront the possibility that I’m so comfortable with Google that its style of results, and my understanding of how to form queries that will get me what I want, influence my impression of other search engines–but even taking that into account, Live Search results usually feel less far smart and refined than Google ones. To me, at least.)
Can we all agree that everyone involved would be best served if the weird tango between Microsoft and Yahoo ended soon–either with a breakup or with marriage? Kumo may be a Japanese word for cloud, but until the question of whether Microsoft and Yahoo will work together on search is resolved, there’s a little gloomy raincloud lurking above Microsoft’s homegrown search efforts, such as Kumo. Or whatever it ends up being called.
Microsoft may have officially ended its bid to buy Yahoo ten months ago, but its perennial flirtations with the venerable, vulnerable Web giant persist. Kevin Turner, chief operating officer of Microsoft, said that the company was keen on establishing a partnership with Yahoo’s search business, in an interview published today in the UK-based newspaper The Times.
Turner’s comments were directed toward Carol Bartz, the new chief executive of Yahoo. Privately, Microsoft has made its intentions known to Bartz and Yahoo’s board of directors, he told The Times. In November, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer raised the possibility of a search partnership between the two companies.
Ballmer then reported met with Yahoo chairman Roy Bostock in January, and Microsoft CFO Chris Liddell sung the merits of a partnership last month.
While all of this was happening, Microsoft was gearing up for a new search push behind the scenes. The company is internally testing the next generation of Windows Live Search that it presently calls “Kumo,” according to reports.
Newsflash to both companies: A partnership is your only option. In order for either company to crawl up and tackle Google, they need to combine resources. Some analysts believe that Google’s market share may be stabilizing, but Microsoft and Yahoo aren’t gaining either. It’s high time for the companies to quit the foreplay and consummate a working relationship.
I’m generally not into following internal machinations at Yahoo very closely–corporate twists and turns mean very little unless they have an impact on the products and services we consumers get. But I did read and admire new Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz’s post on the company’s corporate blog today. It’s pretty unflinching in its weighing of the company’s strengths and weaknesses, at least for a public rumination. (I can’t imagine a post at an official Google blog saying anything even slightly critical about that company’s culture–though it’s easier, of course, for Bartz to criticize given that she’s not responsible for anything that’s gone wrong at Yahoo up into this point.
Bartz’s post talks about a corporate reorg and a new Customer Advocacy Group, and promises services that will be awesome, exciting, and make you say “wow.” Fine. Like I say, the proof is in the products, and any changes there are yet to come. But here’s one upcoming Yahoo item that I am already excited about, which Bartz alludes to in passing: I recently visited the company and checked out its Yahoo Connected TV service, which will be built into TVs from Samsung, Sony, LG, and Vizio. It’s based on Yahoo Widgets–formerly known as Konfabulator, and the technology that pretty much kicked off the trend towards Web widgets a few years ago. The TV-based widgets I saw for news, video, and more looked slick and useful–I left the demo feeling slightly sad that there’s no way I’m going to buy a new TV anytime soon. (The first sets that incorporate the Yahoo software are due next month.)
More on Yahoo Connected TV soon, in a separate post…
Good morning–news is served:
Nokia might make Symbian laptops.
Google Street View’s user photos.
Google News gets ads. Finally.
Find iPhone vulnerability, get money.
The president isn’t Tweeting nowadays.
LG phone sports detachable keyboard.
Jeepers, more Microsoft-Yahoo speculation.
Rumors about PSP successor persist.
Is Windows Mobile 6.5 obsolete?
Vista SP2 release candidate imminent.
Dell’s 10-inch netbook arrives.
Many years ago–I think it was 1998 or thereabouts–I wrote a big feature story for PC World on a bevy of new devices that aimed to bring the Internet to America’s TV sets. I spent weeks living with Microsoft’s Web TV, Gateway 2000’s Destination living-room PC, and other gadgets. They were the first spawn of the technology industry’s irrational exuberance over the idea that the Web and TV were a match made in heaven. I didn’t fall in love with any of them. (I do, however, remember enjoying playing games on the Destination’s giant screen–as I recall, it was all of 32 inches.)
Almost all the devices I tried flopped–Web TV was the closest one to a modest success, and it was embraced by an unexpected audience: senior citizens who wanted to stay in touch with family but who didn’t want to bother with the complexity of a full-blown PC. For close to a decade, the whole notion of putting the Internet on a TV mostly disappeared; even computers built to live in the living room have never really caught on. It wasn’t all that clear that very many people particularly wanted the Net on a TV.
Lately, though, the concept is back, in a bevy of incarnations. Not only am I writing about my experiences with watching Internet TV on a TV via Boxee’s software on an Apple TV, but I’m at work on a new PC World story about gadgets that bring Net TV and other Web content into the living room. And this time around, the whole idea seems more plausible.
A comScore Video Metrix report, released today, confirms what we all knew already: People are watching more and more online video. In fact, U.S. Internet users viewed 14.3 billion videos in December alone.
Google’s Web properties (including YouTube) received the greatest number of hits, accounting for 41% of the online video market. Fox Interactive was the (distant) runner up with a 3.1% share of the market, trailed by Yahoo, Viacom Digital, and Hulu. The average U.S. Internet user watched an average of 96 videos in December, and 78.5% of U.S. Internet users watch online video, according to the comScore report.
Viewers are trending toward short sessions, indicating that they’re not treating the Web like their TV. The average duration videos were watched for was just 3.2 minutes. Hulu users were an exception, spending 10.1 minutes per session.
Furthermore, the most popular YouTube videos of all time are music videos, comedy, and viral shorts. Far fewer people are catching entire television episodes and movies on the Web; although, video downloads and purchases were not tabulated in the report.
NBC hit pay dirt when it placed clips of SNL’s Tina Fey doubling as Sarah Palin online during the presidential election, and plenty of entire TV shows are online, complete with advertising. So there is a financial incentive for old line media to embrace the Web. But both TV companies and TV viewers still seem to be getting their heads around Net video.
When I watched episodes of Star Trek on CBS’s classic television Web site last year, I was bombarded with surveys about the advertisements that I saw. That was very blatant market research. It will be interesting to see how the studios adapt to the Web, and if they can figure out how to turn all those online viewing sessions into the money they’ll need to pay for more content.
Confession time: I do almost all of my Web searching these days at one site, and its name isn’t Yahoo. But I’m intrigued by Yahoo’s Search Pad, a new feature that’s entering testing today. It looks a bit like the soon-to-be-defunct Google Notebook and other existing services, except Search Pad is designed to be smart enough to notice you’re engaging in Web research, whereupon it offers to help you collate sites, snippets of info, and notes.
Only certain Yahoo users are seeing the feature so far, not including me. So most of what I know about it, I know from this video produced by Yahoo:
[vodpod id=ExternalVideo.779285&w=425&h=350&fv=id%3D11859907%26vid%3D4423517%E2%8C%A9%3Den-us%26intl%3Dus%26thumbUrl%3Dhttp%253A%2F%2Fus.i1.yimg.com%2Fus.yimg.com%2Fp%2Fi%2Fbcst%2Fvideosearch%2F2888%2F79567711.jpeg%26embed%3D1]
I’m instinctively skeptical about software and services that think they’re smart enough to figure out what you’re doing and help–call it the “Clippy thinks I’m writing a letter” syndrome–and I’m not clear on whether Search Pad can be invoked manually. (Seems like it should: When I’m researching something on the Web, I’m usually keenly aware that I’m researching something on the Web.) But the video has whetted my appetite sufficiently that I’ll check back to see when Search Pad shows up for me…
Today, Yahoo shared its fourth quarter financial results with investors, the first financial news it’s had since naming Carol Bartz as CEO. While revenue was relatively flat compared to 2007, Yahoo experienced a net loss of $303 million, compared to a net income of $206 million in 2008, due in part to strategic decisions that obliterated shareholder wealth.
According to the company, operating income was goggled up by a sundry of expenses before the customary subtraction of interest, tax and depreciation:
“restructuring charges of $108 million for severance, facilities, and other restructuring costs; a goodwill impairment charge of $488 million related to our international segment; and incremental costs of $7 million incurred for outside advisors related to Microsoft’s proposals to acquire all or a part of the Company, other strategic alternatives, including the Google agreement, the proxy contest, and related litigation defense (collectively, the “strategic alternatives and related matters”)”.
CFO Blake Jorgensen said that cost management and a Yahoo’s “strong balance sheet” helped it navigate 2008’s financial turmoil, and said that the company was well positioned for more challenging economic conditions. Blake probably wishes that he was on on a beach in Aruba sipping piña coladas instead of offering guidance to investors.
Bartz, meanwhile, told those listening in to Yahoo’s conference call that she didn’t take her new gig to sell the company. But she seemed to tippy-toe around questions of whether part of Yahoo, such as its search business, could be up for sale.
Yahoo made the mistake of turning down Microsoft’s $44.6 billion takeover bid, and now, those who remain have to drink from a muddy well.
So Steve, tell us again that you aren’t interested in Yahoo (although lately yes you have been singing a different tune)? Microsoft’s chief executive has reportedly met with Yahoo chairman Roy Bostock, according to a report in the New York Times. This would be the second contact by Ballmer to Yahoo’s higher-ups: he also apparently had an informal conversation with incoming CEO Carol Bartz also this week.
This seems to confirm the reporting from Tuesday which indicated that Microsoft has proposals ready to present to the Yahoo board any time now. The speed at which this seems to be happening also leads me to believe Yahoo is truly attempting to have something ready to go by the time it announces its earnings less than two weeks from now.
What exactly has been said nobody knows, but it probably involves the two companies merging their search assets. Bartz is apparently a little reluctant to give up complete control of the search business, so whatever happens Yahoo will likely still have a hand in the final product.
