White knight, black heart. Here's a bit of chilling news: Rupert Murdoch's News Corp is apparently in talks with Yahoo on ways to save it from the clutches of Microsoft. That's a bit like being rescued from a fire-breathing dragon by a man-eating shark. The tea leaves suggest News Corp would swap MySpace for as much as 20 per cent of Yahoo. What they're less clear on is whether this would make Yahoo more palatable to Microsoft (and thus worth US$40 a share) or turn Yahoo into one of those things you have to choke down with a nose clamp and a tumbler of Scotch. Still, it would be fun to lock Ballmer and Murdoch together in a conference room and see who comes out alive.
No business like SCO business. It's too early for April Fool's Day, so it must be true. Some adventurous private venture firm is investing US$100 million in SCO so that it can emerge from bankruptcy (and, presumably, fork over what it owes to Novell). There are some strings attached, however. CEO Darl McBride would be urged to pursue his lifelong dream of becoming a NASCAR champion, far from SCO's doors. Then again, maybe they just can't bear to watch the tech world's longest running soap operas come to a close.
Loss leaders. A woman is suing Best Buy for US$54 million after its Geek Squad misplaced her laptop. (Apparently it was a really really nice laptop.) Raelyn Campbell has a better chance of hitting a spy satellite with a slingshot than collecting anything close to that amount, but she certainly got everyone's attention. Just imagine how much she would have asked for if they had lost her MacBook Air.