In one of the more bizarre responses in a three-way merger deal fracas since the Viacom/Paramount/Blockbuster deal of the early 1990s, a Microsoft statement this afternoon — ostensibly to refute some of the details described in a Yahoo statement early Sunday morning — also manages to separate Microsoft’s point of view from that of financier [...]

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Yahoo formally rejected a proposal from Microsoft and Carl Icahn in a statement issued on Saturday.
They had been given 24 hours to reach a decision by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on Friday night. They reached a decision, but probably not the one that Ballmer and Icahn were looking for.
Yahoo says that its advertising deal with [...]

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News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch said it was “very unlikely” his company would reach any type of deal with Yahoo and said Yahoo and Microsoft will not be involved in any type of transaction.
On the Microsoft/Yahoo deal Murdoch said,” There won’t be a deal. There’s bad personal feelings.”
Microsoft was in negotiations earlier this year to [...]

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You know what they say about work and play, so even as Yahoo gets eyed by Steve Ballmer, interrogated by investors, and generally abused by Carl Icahn, here’s a nice side project: it’s trying to offer a lot of downloadable games for free.
Around 400 of the things are expected to become available by year’s end. [...]

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To help make more of a dent in the Google-dominated search and ad markets, Yahoo is rolling out an initiative that will open the door wider to its search service, but mainly for developers and ISVs willing to host Yahoo ads on their sites.
“BOSS [Build Your Own Search Service]…is an API to tap into Yahoo’s [...]

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A certain tradition involving Charlie Brown, Lucy, and a football began over 50 years ago. Now, as Yahoo has once again claimed it’s open to the idea of an acquisition, it’s beginning to look like Steve Ballmer and Jerry Yang might set some record of their own.
Lucy was never in danger of getting fired, [...]

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Though some US legislators expressed concerns about Google’s growing power in online advertising, one big ad firm welcomed Yahoo’s search ad agreement with Google.
In the US, Microsoft and Congressman Joe Barton (R-TX) publicly fretted about the increasing control Google possesses over contextual search advertising. High-ranking Microsoft executive Kevin Johnson complained in France about Google taking [...]

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Microsoft executives said the company does not plan to make a slew of Internet acquisitions since it ended its bid for Yahoo.
There has been speculation that Microsoft would possibly buy Facebook, which it has a small stake in or Time Warner’s AOL along with a number of other companies.
“People don’t understand what they’re talking about,” chief [...]

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Kevin Johnson, president of the Platforms and Services Division at Microsoft, whined a bit about the pact between Google and Yahoo, during a debate in Cannes about advertising topics.
Yahoo EVP Hilary Schneider gave Johnson a little something to chew on in exulting over the company’s advertising agreement with Google. Valued roughly at $800 million in [...]

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The founder of bookmarking service Delicious, Joshua Schachter, plans to follow several other executives out the door at Yahoo.
When Yahoo was on a bit of a spending spree for social media-type startups, Delicious represented one of several companies on Yahoo’s shopping list. Delicious offers a social bookmarking service, where people can keep and share the [...]

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