Is CNET's Poison Pill Shareholder-Friendly?
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CNET's anti-takeover provision may be boardroom-friendly, but it's not necessarily good for investors.
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Microsoft is applying for a patent for an operating system that starts out crippled.  You must pay to do things like take the throttle off network speed, disk access, install drivers, install software, and more.  Trust me, I rarely even visit Groklaw, even if this is my second consecutive blog entry with a link to a Groklaw article. My VarLinux.org readers posted the article, A Brave New Modular World, and I had to share it.
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NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- In a move designed to fortify itself a potential hostile takeovers, News Corp. adopted a &quot;poison pill&quot; shareholder rights plan.
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IPOs are risky enough. Why are some companies making them more confusing?
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At the same time, Oracle&#39;s in court trying to strip PeopleSoft of its poison-pill provisions. By Antone Gonsalves, TechWeb News.
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Avoid these stocks -- you may already own them.
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CNET Networks, the once high-flying technology site, may be positioned for a hostile takeover.
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3Com makes a play for security. But is it enough for investors?
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I just figured something out, and it's the kind of thing that's best said publicly, even though it's likely to: 1. Be misunderstood and 2. Upset some people. But since it's all about this blog it really is best to air it here. First what triggered the epiphany. I was over at Loic Le Meur's house in San Francisco yesterday having lunch with his family and friends. We were all drinking wine (very good wine of course), enjoying the view, and talking about this and that, when the subject turned to Mike Arrington. Loic said that Mike told him that we used to be best friends. I couldn't figure out what that meant, because our friendship was the business kind of friendship not the personal kind. What does it mean to best friends in that way? And how does that relate to having a blog? It never occurred to me that friendship meant that (here's the epiphany) that I would only say positive things about Mike's business. It didn't occur to me until I heard Loic's side of a blog-fight that I saw happen from a distance, with Sam Sethi, Mike and Loic.  Complicated? You bet. Too complicated. An unspoken deal that I never agreed to. When Mike was starting TechCrunch, I pointed to his blog all the time, with glowing phrases. Because I was truly impressed with what he was doing and because I wanted to encourage other people to do it too. I wanted people to write about technology products based on how they used them, not based on alliances, investment, posturing of execs, the crappy stuff that means almost nothing to users, and imho is just a substitute for actually understanding the technology. Mike was approaching products the way I felt they should be approached. Hence the praise. Fact is, my opinion of Mike, as a person, hasn't changed much in the last couple of years. He has a personal charm and charisma that not everyone finds appealing, but I do. I like hanging out with the guy. However, that doesn't mean that if my opinion of TechCrunch, his business, isn't uniformly positive (and of course these days it is actually fairly negative) that I will withhold it. But it's also part of Mike's way of dealing with people that he sees criticism as betrayal. I just don't see it that way. I've had the shit kicked out of me so many times, and as a programmer I understand that criticism is necessary to perfect a user interface, even to get the damned thing working, that even when it hurts, I have to push the hurt aside and listen to what people are saying, and try to respond to it. Professionalism demands it.  Anyway, one of the reasons I want to write this now is that I've written about Loic's business here a couple of times in very positive terms. I don't want anyone, esp Loic, to assume that this will always be so. If they get in the way of other creative people, or otherwise act as a poor example of entrepreneurship in technology, of course I will write about it, and will say what I think. I would expect Loic and people at his company to take what I write to heart, and consider it. My feelings won't be hurt if they don't do what I say.  Same as when I said Facebook sucks. Or when I criticize Techmeme. This isn't in any way meant to reflect on the quality of the people at Facebook (some of whom I know to be outstanding people of high principle) or Gabe Rivera who I know to be a very smart and competent and honorable person. It's possible to critcize someone's work and still admire the person. My epiphany is that a lot of people who thought were my friends, didn't understand this very basic thing about me.
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Business & money: Investors who buy shares in companies to agitate for change could face fines or even prosecution.
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hype7 writes &quot;CNet&#39;s News.com.com is reporting that AT&amp;T is reconsidering its corporate IT investment in Microsoft Windows - with both Mac OS X and Linux being considered.
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CNET has a great set of brands. But its cost structure is out of whack.
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Corporate takeovers are often profitable for investors, so why stop them?
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Hefty valuations = a bet on the future.  That future is clearly open source + SaaS, based on the multiples people are willing to pay.
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Was the Novell/Microsoft deal a worthwhile well-meaning effort between renegade open-source geeks at Microsoft and geeks at Novell that got derailed by salespeople and management, after which it was turned into a nightmare deal with the devil?  I raise this question because I know someone with ties to people at both Microsoft and Novell.  He has a credible story to tell about what really happened, and how much it differs from what we now know about the Novell/Microsoft deal.  Unfortunately, I haven't been able to get him to write up the history - yet.  While I continue to pester him, here's the short version, third hand.
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An hedge fund group is pressuring CNet for changes. Usually that means the investors think the company is undervalued and wants to push management to sell.
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Today, Seesmic, the company founded by Loic Lemeur, announced their initial $6 million funding. Several people noticed that my name isn't on the list of investors.  I'll probably end up kicking myself when Seesmic becomes the next Google or YouTube. I remain a fan of the company and Loic and his team and will be rooting for them.  Why did I get cold feet? It has nothing to do with the product or the company, both of which appear to be outstanding. It's the stock market. I had to make the final Seesmic decision as I was getting out of stock, at a significant loss. The only stock I hold now is AAPL, and sadly, it's way under the price I paid for it a few months ago. Like a lot of other investors, right now stocks give me the willies. I will likely get back in, slowly, a little bit every week to average out the price, hoping the market has found a bottom.