Microsoft, one of the most aggressively competitive, brainiac-attracting, technologically superior, and oh, yes, cash-gushingly profitable companies of all time, can"t for the life of it make a dime on the Internet.
Everyone knows that Google remains the company of online advertising, generating operating profits of $1.7 billion last quarter on revenues of $5.5 billion. Yet even industry doormats Yahoo and AOL are profitable.
Desperate to catch Google, Microsoft has been spending like mad on data centers, people, and marketing. But its online audience is relatively small - much smaller than Google"s - and those costs grossly outweigh sales.
It"s quite possible that Microsoft is going after the Internet with too much energy - or at least attacking in too many directions. Rather than carve out some element of the web where it can shine, Microsoft pursues everything...