Yahoo

Yahoo may join Google instead of Microsoft

A source familiar with Yahoo Incorporated’s strategy suggested that the company may consider a business alliance with Google Incorporated, as an alternative to Microsoft’s $44.6 billion takeover proposal. Yahoo management is considering revisiting talks it held with Google several months ago on an alliance as an alternative to Microsoft’s bid, that source said. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Google’s chief executive Eric Schmidt called Yahoo’s chief executive Jerry Yang to offer his company’s help in any effort to thwart Microsoft’s bid. Details of what conclusions the two men came to have yet to surface.
At $31 a share, Yahoo believes the bid undervalues the company, two sources said. In other words, it is quite possible that Yahoo’s efforts to find an alternative bidder could simply be a measure to pressure Microsoft to boost its bid. At the end of the day though, there is still no information of an alternative bid being placed, be it from Google, News Corporation or yet another company. I’ll try to stay on top of things as more information becomes available.
News source: Reuters

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Microsoft Proposes Acquisition of Yahoo! for $31 per Share

Microsoft Corp. is offering $44.6 billion in cash and stock for search engine operator Yahoo Inc. in a move to boost its competitive position in the online services market.
The unexpected announcement Friday comes as Microsoft, the world’s biggest software company, seeks new ways to compete more effectively against the search and online advertising powerhouse Google Inc.

Here is what the official site reads-

Microsoft Corp. today announced that it has made a proposal to the Yahoo! Inc. Board of Directors to acquire all the outstanding shares of Yahoo! common stock for per share consideration of $31 representing a total equity value of approximately $44.6 billion. Microsoft’s proposal would allow the Yahoo! shareholders to elect to receive cash or a fixed number of shares of Microsoft common stock, with the total consideration payable to Yahoo! shareholders consisting of one-half cash and one-half Microsoft common stock. The offer represents a 62 percent premium above the closing price of Yahoo! common stock on Jan. 31, 2008.

News source: MSNBC NEWS

Read more on Microsoft Press Page

Yahoo! Messenger for Vista™ released

Yahoo today released the preview version of Yahoo! Messenger for Vista, the first Yahoo! Messenger built from the ground up for the Windows Vista operating system. This is your chance to try it out .

This is a preview version only (pre-beta) so not everything is in here that you might be used to seeing in other versions of Yahoo! Messenger. Here’s a list of the features included today:

- Entirely new interface that harnesses the power of WPF, the graphics subsystem in Windows Vista
- Organize your conversations into tabs, or drag and drop a tab out to create a new window
- Keep up with your favorite contacts by dragging them into the Windows Sidebar gadget
- Send enhanced emoticons that have some extra oomph
- Change the color of your IM windows with a built-in skin chooser. Go crazy with a different skin for every IM window!

- Adjust the display size of your contacts with a handy slider
- Arrange your contact list into multiple columns just by resizing your window
- Send instant messages to your Yahoo! and Windows Live Messenger contacts
- Send files to friends as large as 2 GB
- Find contacts quickly with the contact search bar. Type in a few letters of the contact’s name or ID and they’ll come up in filtered results.
- As-you-type spell checker that’s smart enough to know that “LOL” is not something to correct
- A preferences menu you can access by right-clicking anywhere at the top of the main Messenger window

What are you waiting for? Download it now!

Yahoo! Messenger for Windows 9.0.0.797 Beta

Introducing Yahoo! Messenger 9.0 Beta, the next version of our popular IM software for Windows. This new version has a whole new look and feel, along with some great new features that make it well worth the upgrade. Here’s a quick look at what’s new in Yahoo! Messenger 9.0 Beta:

- A whole new look for your contact list. Keep it in detail view to see larger Avatar images for your friends, or switch to compact list view (in the Contacts menu). Plus, you can just hover and click to IM, SMS or call a friend.

- Brand new skins and emoticons! Click the dot near the top of your Messenger window to choose a skin, and check the emoticon menu for the new ones that were inspired by user entries in our Emoticontest earlier this year (more on our winners in a future post).

- New Flickr integration in the photo sharing feature. Easily share photos from your Flickr.com account, or save photos shared with you directly to Flickr.

- A new in-line media player that makes it easy to view maps, photos and videos from sites like Yahoo! Video and YouTube right in the IM window. No plug-ins needed, no extra downloads — it’s built right in. Just send a video, map or photo link to another friend who’s also on 9.0 to try it out.

- New features for voice calls. You can have your incoming Phone In or free PC calls forwarded to another number like your mobile, home or office phone, even if you’re signed out of Messenger (Phone Out account required). Plus there’s a new way to get voicemail. When someone leaves you a voicemail in Messenger, an email is sent to you with an MP3 of the voice message attached.

Download Yahoo! Messenger 9.0 Beta

Yahoo messenger beta 2 second release avaiable for download.

The Yahoo Messenger for mac has undergone some more changes and is avaiable for download now. Since the first release of Yahoo Messenger for Mac beta 2 first release ,the messenger has undergone the following changes:-

- Improved stability and compatibility with Mac OS X Version 10.5 (Leopard)
- Some small interface improvements, including a new Show/Hide Display Images button in the IM and chat room windows
- Improved chat room layout, with the list of chatters in a left hand, scrollable panel with age/sex/location details available on hover (if the user is sharing his/her profile)

Updates for Yahoo Messenger for the Web

The Web Messenger by Yahoo received some major updates.This new release includes:– Sending of SMS!-Now you can send text messages (SMS) to your friends’ mobile phones for free, right from Yahoo! Messenger for the Web. When your friend replies, it comes back to you in Messenger. You’ll notice the contact list is now divided into two areas: regular IM contacts and Mobile Contacts.SMS is only available when messaging to mobile phones in the U.S., India and Canada. Note that it’s free for you to SMS from Messenger but your friends will incur any applicable data charges from their carrier to receive your messages.

Brand new, local language versions for Thailand and Indonesia.

9 new languages for the Indian version (Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Bengali, Punjabi, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada). After signing in at http://in.webmessenger.yahoo.com, start an IM with a friend and choose the Indian language you want to chat in from a drop-down menu.

If you haven’t already given Yahoo! Messenger for the Web a try,then do it immediately. There’s no download required, making it really handy when you’re at work, on the road or away from your own computer.

Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta 2

A very good news for all Mac OS lovers.Yahoo has released the much awaited Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta 2 .The new version has got many new features,although voice calling is still unavailable in this version but we can still hope that it will soon be in the coming versions. This new version includes:

Message archiving: All of your IM and chat room conversations can now be archived on your computer.Improved stability for webcam and file transfer: There were issues with these in the past version so the team did a lot of bug fixes and under-the-hood work to improve them.More emoticons:The additional emoticons that are in the other versions of Messenger are available to Mac users, so Mac users now have them all!(The screenshot avaible has been taken from the official blog since I dont have a Mac)

Yahoo! Messenger 8.1.0.421 Released

Yahoo! Messenger is a popular instant messaging client and protocol provided by Yahoo!. Yahoo! Messenger is provided free of charge and can be downloaded and used with a generic “Yahoo! ID” which also allows access to other Yahoo! services, such as Yahoo! Mail, where users can be automatically notified when they receive new email. Yahoo! offers PC to PC telephone, file transfers, webcam hosting, text messaging service, and chat rooms in various categories. In addition to instant messaging features similar to those offered by ICQ, it also offers (on Microsoft Windows) many unique features such as: IMVironments (customizing the look of Instant Message windows), address-book integration and Custom Status Messages. It was also the first major IM client to feature Buzzing and music-status. Another recently added feature is customized avatars.

Features:
* Yahoo! Voice - Yahoo! Voice is a Voice over IP PC-PC, PC-Phone and Phone-to-PC service provided by Yahoo! via its Yahoo! Messenger instant messaging application.
* Voicemail and file sharing - Yahoo! added voicemail and file sending capabilities to their client. File-sharing of sizes up to 1GB was added.
* Plug-ins -As of 8.0, Yahoo! Messenger has added the ability for users to create plug-ins (via the use of the freely available Yahoo! Messenger Plug-in SDK), which are then hosted and showcased on the Yahoo! Plug-in gallery.
* Interoperability with Windows Live Messenger-This allows,for Yahoo! and Windows Live Messenger users to chat to each other without the need to create an account on the other service,provided both contacts use the latest versions of the clients. For now,it’s impossible to talk using the voice service among both messengers.
Download: Yahoo! Messenger 8.1.0.421
View: Yahoo! Messenger Home Page