http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/technology/article1747293.ece
This would be huge if it happened. Reading this story reminded me of another from the 1980's.. back then, Sears (the US retailer) was so preocupied with defeating K-Mart and Montgomery Ward (other retailers) that they didn't see Wal Mart coming.. the rest as they say, is history.
I wonder if domain names aren't the Walmart in this scenario. Everybody is so busy jockeying for a position on "Platform A" that they are underestimating the potential of "Platform D".
"Love" this quote in the Bloomberg piece because it's so applicable to Platform D ... "It's all about the battle for the advertisement market. Who will be the dominant force on the Internet,'' said Wim Zwanenburg, who helps oversee 27 billion euros at Bank Degroof Group, including Microsoft shares. ``Microsoft won't be able to catch up with Google on its own. If you want to play a role, you'll have to gain market share and conquer a position.''
This doesn't really surprise me, about a week ago I heard rumor Yahoo was going to "pull back" on their involvement in the domain space even though it's been a pretty lucrative vertical for them historically.
First thing I thought was that this could only be the result of positioning themselves to enter into discussions with Microsoft.
***FS*** Will be interesting to see. Most domainers could make a significant cut of what they do on Yahoo PPC with Banner advertising alone.. so not important what Yahoo does in domain channel really. They could do "a lot" more through display though
Posted by: Peter | May 04, 2007 at 10:53 AM