Yahoo! Microsoft Deal: Battle Of The Journalists

After being glued to the TV set and ndtv.com for three straight days watching the Mumbai terror attacks, tonight was seeming like a slow news time. And then Times of London broke this news about Microsoft coming back to the table to discuss a $20 billion Yahoo! search deal. I got all excited and immediately went over to Tweetscan to see what the twitter world was talking about this event. Sure enough, there were several people already echoing the same news over and over.

The Missing Confirmation From Kara Swisher

One thing conspicuously missing was any mention of this deal on AllThingsD.com from Kara Swisher. From what I have learnt in the past several months, she seems to have the best sources inside Yahoo! Kara is the one breaking all Yahoo! related scoops. And she has been right all the time. How could she miss this one? There was something amiss. The Times Online story was still not confirmed in my mind.

So I tweeted about it and got a quick response from her. She also posted her blog update proclaiming this as "Total Fiction".


Battle Of The Journalists

So who might be right on this one? Is Times Of London publishing an unconfirmed rumor as a legitimate story? Or has Kara Swisher lost all of her Yahoo! sources? I am sure the story would unfold more in the morning and certainly Monday morning would have much more clarity. And I am glad this saga is happening during the weekend while the markets are closed. The wild swings that we have been seeing in NASDAQ would have made day traders very happy if this news came out during normal business hours.

One funny tidbit about this journalistic adventure -- the Times Of London is owned by News Corp. And News Corp. also owns AllThingsD.com where Kara blogs. So the same corporate entity seems to be sending us this story and then contradicting itself.

As I said, next few hours would provide more clarity on this. Meanwhile, I am preparing to participate in a rally in support of victims of Mumbai Terror attack in San Francisco on Sunday 11/30 at 2:30pm. Care to join?