“At the public memorial for Jobs last year, Cook reminded all employees that Steve didn’t want them to always ask themselves ‘what would Steve do,’” Eric Jackson writes for Forbes. “That’s not what Walt Disney wanted and that’s not what Jobs wanted. (Of course, this being Steve Jobs, I’m sure he had lots of strong ideas on core principles for how the company should continue to be run.)”

“One area that we should expect Apple to also go off script in the future is the whole area of acquisitions. To this point, Apple has been most comfortable doing small, tuck-in acquisitions. Siri is a perfect example of this,” Jackson writes. “Yet, it is inevitable that Apple will need to do bigger acquisitions and/or move into new areas beyond just selling phones, computers, iPads, and TVs. The bigger they become, the more difficult it is to keep growing earnings 90% a year.”

Jackson writes, “There are endless possible acquisition targets that investment bankers can dream up for Apple to buy. Facebook and Twitter are probably the sexiest names. They also clearly would help build out Apple’s skills in social Web stuff, where Ping is the most obvious example of where they have failed to connect with users… However, I do think buying Yahoo! makes a lot of sense for Apple. I can already hear the guffaws. Yahoo! seems to be the butt of all Internet stock jokes these days. Why would Apple want to strap a perennial stock loser for the last 5 years like Yahoo! to its back?”

Here’s why:
1. Buying Yahoo! wouldn’t be that expensive.
2. Apple needs to either stay in or get out of the advertising business with iAd.
3. Ironically, beyond an ecosystem of apps, all the big mobile players in the future will need a core stable of amazing mobile apps to differentiate.
4. Search.
5. Patents.
6. Payments.
7. IntoNow.

Much more in the full article here.

[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader "Edward W." for the heads up.]