It seems like not too long ago that Yahoo and Microsoft were hyping up their search relationship that they were forging. Wait, that’s because it wasn’t too long ago. And oddly enough, there is gossip that Yahoo wants out already.
What exactly did they team up on? Yahoo used to be the gorilla in the search engine room, until Google came along. They actually still take a larger market share in a few other countries but, their footprint isn’t as large as it used to be and they’ve been trying to catch up to Google ever since they stole their thunder. Google and Yahoo tried to forge a deal back around 2008 that later fell through. That’s where Yahoo and Microsoft started teaming up. Microsoft’s search engine, Bing, and Yahoo started meshing some search data, and Yahoo moved their Pay-Per-Click portal to Bing. Same with their Webmaster Tools portal. They moved a lot. Then along came Executive, Marissa Mayer, ironically from Google. Good or bad, Marissa has shaken things up quite a bit at Yahoo, and the chatter at the watercooler from this Wall Street Journal article is that there is some interest in discontinuing the partnership with Microsoft. However, as the article continues, it states that it is unlikely anytime soon. The initial deal was signed for a 10 year term. Ouch.