Posts tagged acquisition

Andy Ihnatko on Microsoft's purchase of Skype

Mr. Ihnatko hit all the points in this piece, it really worth a read. My first thoughts when I heard about this seemingly done deal were the follwowing, in chronological order:

  • “WTF?”
  • “*Snerk* They don’t even have to “improve” the interface.”
  • “That’s a lotta money.”
  • “Didn’t Skype use some fancy encryption?”
Another thought I had is best summed-up by Mr. Ihnatko:
There’s also a hell of a lot of value in simply owning one of the world’s largest social-media networks. Skype users who are both (a) smart and (b) paranoid will now re-read their Skype terms-of-service agreement more carefully: Microsoft just bought a fairly comprehensive database of who knows whom all over the world. (I wouldn’t worry too much. Microsoft, unlike Google and Facebook, has yet to figure out how to monetize evil. It’s almost adorable.)

Discussion about Apple's possible acquisitions

There’s a good discussion going on in the Ars Technica forums about what Apple could possibly want to buy with all the cash they have at hand.

HP to launch a WebOS tablet by October

Talking to Digitimes, VP of HP Taiwan’s Personal Computing division, Monty Wong, has announced that HP will use WebOS, which they acquired alongside the rest of Palm, to power tablets and smartphones.
An official announcement will come at the end of July and the device will supposedly be available by the end of October.

via Heise Online and Digitimes

I’m very fond of WebOS and have high hopes for a tablet using this system. Which is why I sincerely hope that HP will play their cards right. I don’t however, like how they feel the need to pre-announce it. Everybody expects them to use WebOS to that end — it’s the only logical thing to do with it — and they should’ve at least waited until they had a nice working prototype to show to the public.