Thank God, No MicroFlickr!

Anyone of the geeky persuasion should know well that Microsoft and Yahoo looked darn well like they were about to become one. Microsoft made an offer a while back, Yahoo rejected it, Microsoft made threats, they talked some more, etc.

For us that are big flickr fans, like myself, and maybe NOT the most huge Microsoft fans, many of us were nervous. We REALLY LIKE flickr as it is. We have invested our time and photos (and now videos) in flickr and do NOT want to see it change.

Well, fortunately, it seems now like we are safe. TechCrunch has broken the news today that Microsoft will soon pull their offer off the table.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/05/03/breaking-microsoft-walks/

Let me be amongst those to quickly say....... Halle-freaking-lujah!

Walking Away from 20 Million Dollars

I have absolutely got to wonder what it feels like to WALK AWAY from 20 million dollars. Well, that is exactly how team Xobni feels right now.

Xobni is a startup company which provides an outlook plugin that brings much more rich content out of the pile of data that is your email. It find phone numbers, connections between contacts and makes it SO MUCH EASIER to find that file someone sent you several weeks back.

Well, they have apparently been in talks for several weeks with Microsoft to sell themselves over to Microsoft. And they have walked away. Yep, $20,000,000.... No thanks, we're fine. In short, they were a bit unsure in the long run where the future would hold Xobni in a Microsoft world. They are working on a version for Yahoo mail and will likely follow up with Gmail, etc. Those options would likely have disappeared with this deal.

Way to go, Xobni! I am SO looking forward to Xobni for Gmail! :)

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/04/30/xobni-walks-away-from-a-microsoft-deal/

If anyone wants a Xobni invite, leave me a comment. I have a handful left....