It's over, finito, kaput. The fat lady hasn't merely stopped singing, she's taken off her girdle and waddled home. There are now so many forks stuck into the Microsoft Yahoo deal that it looks like a cutlery display.
This time its really really really really really really really really over. Really.
Or maybe not.
I understand Carl Icahn was so upset at the news that he locked himself in his bedroom and pistol-whipped his Jerry Yang doll. ("You've been a very very naughty CEO and now you must resign your board seat.")
But as one disgruntled suitor walks out, in comes a new one looking spiffy in a bow tie and carrying a bouquet of pansies. Moving from a forced marriage to Microsoft to a 'friends with benefits' non-exclusive deal with Google is like going from shacking up with some hulking brute to dating your gay cousin. You may look stylish when you're out shopping together, but this marriage isn't going anywhere hot.
The grammatically challenged Michael Arrington of TechCrunch was also chewing on his pillow and sobbing about the horrible injustice done to him by Yang et al. To hear him tell it, Yahoo's decision has destroyed the company and the Internet itself:
Yahoo's hatred of Microsoft runs so deep that they were actually, in the end, willing to destroy the future of their company just to keep it independent for a short while longer. They've ignored the wishes of their shareholders, employees and many now former key employees in killing that deal. And apart from Google, CEO Jerry Yang, President Sue Decker and possibly Tim O'Reilly, I don't believe there is anyone in the world that is happy with what has happened.
Given that in Arrington's world everyone is a VC, that might seem true. But in the world where the rest of us live, most folks really didn't want Microsoft swallowing Yahoo and then coughing up the fur and bones, like an owl digesting a mouse. And once Microsoft gets their teeth into something, you know they won't stop chewing til it's gone.
What's the matter Michael, did you short Google's stock or something?
Problem is, this story really isn't over over. Yahoo still needs to elect a new board, so there's a proxy battle yet to fight. Microsoft is still third in Net search ads and slipping further behind, and Steve Ballmer would rather floss with barbed wire than lose at anything.
There's really only one way to settle this. Jerry Yang and Steve Ballmer wearing sumo wrestler suits, battling mano-a-mano. Last man standing gets to breathe Google's fumes as it rockets into space, leaving them all behind.