Yahoo and Ebay has formed strategic partnership, very short of a merger. As I mentioned earlier, its been rumored for some time. I think Yahoo is the primary loser of the deal, since Ebay is kind of a lost cause when fighting Google. The devils are in the details.
Search and Advertising:
Yahoo will provide Overture ads and search results for Ebay: Ahh! Yahoo should create a good search engine. Don’t bribe companies to use your search engine. At least bribe them for a reasonable product. Will any one stop using Google because Ebay uses Yahoo? This must been some Kalifornia thing.
Integrated Commerce Payment System:
Yahoo will use PayPal: What? You are going to give up to 3% of transaction fee to Ebay. Yahoo, you can create your own PayPal and make more money then you your video, tech news, shopping etc combined! Ohh and don’t forget to give all your YPN publisher name and details to PayPal. I guess that list would be great when Microsoft buys Ebay.
Co-Branded eBay Toolbar:
Ebay has a toolbar? OMG. So Yahoo is going to replace its spyware with Ebay’s spyware. At least you should have bargained for co-branded Yahoo toolbar.
“Click-to-Call” Advertising Functionality:
You gotta be kidding me. Is this a pipe dream from Kalifornia? Do you know the demographic of Instant Messenger? Teenagers. Because they don’t have jobs or money. You expect them to call your advertisers. Better yet you expect these advertisers to pay you for this demographic to call them.
And people wonder about Excite, AltaVista, etc.