Or Maybe I Won't Be Working for the Evil Empire...

...Unless of course the Yankees are acquiring one of my many employers.

Microsoft says no deal!! (For now.) Nice write up by Arrington here. My take? This isn't over. What happens when Yahoo's stock tanks after Microsoft "walks away?" I've seen multi-year takeover battles between tech giants before. Guess what? They usually end with a deal that was inevitable happening after much theatre and many denials.

My hope is that Jerry & Co. don't think they've dodged the bullet. Yahoo is still not living up to its potential and Wall Street is still unhappy. The board needs to learn from this and bust out with a gutsy, bold strategic move before the stock falls so far, Microsoft doesn't need to haggle at $31/share. One surprising data point I've heard from friends in Yahoo's management? They welcomed this deal because evil or no, Microsoft "at least has balls." Ouch. When Valley people welcome a sale to Microsoft, that's pretty extreme. To be fair, Yahoo had 'em in not caving to Wall Street-- and generally everyone's-- pressure on this deal. Let's hope it was the waking-up of a sleeping giant and not a one-time thing.

[Disclaimer: None of my Yahoo reporting is gleaned as a result of working there three days a week. All meetings and calls with sources are people gained through my independent reporting in the valley for the last 10 years and are done on my non-Yahoo time.]