“Amazon and Microsoft tonight agreed to a cross-licensing deal for each other’s patents,” Electronista reports. “The deal gives Microsoft special access to technology behind the Kindle reader…”
MacDailyNews Take: Heh, heh, they said “technology.” In, of all things, the Kindle. What does Microsoft get, access to Dykstra’s super glue? As for what Amazon receives from Microsoft, two words: “Brown Kindle.”
Electronista continues, “The deal gives Microsoft special access to technology behind the Kindle reader as well as Amazon’s implementation of Linux on servers. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, including what technology Amazon would get, but the online retailer will pay Microsoft an unmentioned sum as part of the transaction.”
MacDailyNews Take: Maybe Amazon gets access to Microsoft’s very best technology, the only one that actually usually works: Vapor. Microsoft gets what they couldn’t master with the Zune: Making a poor-seller sound like something relevant and successful.
Electronista continues, “Microsoft hasn’t said what its plans are for the deal but acknowledged that the move would help it be ‘more creative and collaborative’ and speed up the launch of ‘new and compelling products.'”
MacDailyNews Take: “Innovative.” You forget to drop in “innovative,” you paeans to mediocrity.
Electronista continues, “The agreement fuels speculation that Microsoft is intent on entering the e-reader market and comes amid continued talk of of the Courier tablet still being in development.”
MacDailyNews Take: It’s an fargin’ computer graphic! In a video. It’s vapor, pumped into the world just before Apple unveiled an actual working product that’s soon to ship, in order to freeze the very idiots who’re still trying to sell their Zunes on eBay. Sheesh.
Electronista reports, “Microsoft has never officially confirmed the widely leaked Courier, but the existence of the iPad may pressure Microsoft into turning the device into a real product to prevent Apple from cornering the category.”
MacDailyNews Take: Yeah. Like they did with the Zune.
Full article here.
You said “fargin'”…
Microsoft isn’t even trying anymore to hide their disdain or inabilty to create anything internally. They’ve officially raised the white flag in that arena.
Yawn
MDN MW: “brown” as in “Zune-brown”
What’s the opposite of development?
Is there even such a thing?
Funny, but I read cross-dressing…
Stave Ballmer in a little black dress and 3″ heels, kindling.
It’s fun watching Microsoft flail their arms in a desperate attempt to stay relevant.
Wow well amazon just killed the kindle by honing forces with Microsoft. I wonder what color BSOD is gonna be on the kindle.
Yawn……. In other news, Toyota and Microsoft have have to come an agreement to give Microsoft complete control of Toyota’s cars. In return, Microsoft promises to limit any sudden unexpected speedup to 90 mph.
The only field left to get in that Microsoft has any real experience would be copiers.
“Microsoft: Putting the ‘me’ back in mimeograph…..”
Yeah, that was supposed to be ‘ME’.
Obama sez: “Microsoft be too big to fail.”
Obama sez: “We’ll look after Microsoft now. They have unions, too, right? If not, they soon will.”
Obama sez: “We will ax our federal officials to probe deeply into reports of Apple’s flaming iPods and iPhones. And iPads. And Macs.”
Obama sez: “We recommend people do not buy Apple products. Buy Microsoft instead. Here’s $100 cash back.”
Obama sez: “You don’t like it? You stupid asses voted me in. Payback’s a bitch. I’ll do whatever the hell I want to do.”
Obama sez: “Honda’s next.”
iWish
There’s velopment and de-velopment.
Sheesh… nothing like dancing with the devil. Good luck Amazon, this smacks of desperation.
“…new and compelling products.”
Like certain political slugs, call it what it isn’t.
Microsoft come up with the courier concept to make people think they have a plan.
Then wait for Apple to bring out the item. Microsoft then gets the product, thanks for the money Ballmer, and copies it with a product that is near it.
Then they say they are “innovators”
Flushing idea!
Boo hooo
I can’t compete so I’m going to start buying the shopping malls.
Microsoft’s innovations:
_
Oh Boy, the Microsoft new and improved “iPad Killer” tablet is a year or two from being introduced! Can’t wait!
Both can’t innovate they way out of a cardboard box. So it makes sense for them to partner. Just like Lloyd and Harry from Dumb & Dumber… perfect pairing of the two.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”wink” style=”border:0;” />
So Microsoft does a jedi mind trick on Amazon, getting them to pay Microsoft… for what, exactly? The privilege of creating buggy and insecure Kindles in the future?
Amazon has clearly not studied their history at all – how many other companies have done “deals” with Microsoft, and come out ahead on the deal? Heck, Amazon are already behind, since they coughed up money to Microsoft for some reason. A very dumb move by Amazon.
Of the two, I think Amazon is making the better move here. Amazon needs to go back to their core competency – distribution. They can not keep up with the likes of Apple on hardware design and manufacturing. This deal with MS would for all intents, get Amazon out of the hardware side of the equation, and leave them with the ebook distribution. But the bad part of it for Amazon is that they are pinning themselves to MS. MS does not / has not / will not ever innovate. They will make a second rate under powered, over bloated Tablet device, and use Kindle as the ebook reader / distributor. But even at that, I have to figure an under powered, over bloated Windows Tablet would sell better than their current 2 million Kindles over 3 years, and that will give Amazon a LOT of revenue in ebook sales, without the hassles of hardware design and manufacturing.
@MDN
I understand, I really do, and I agree. But I am offended by “Harry “Negro Dialect” Reid” his comments are in poor taste and I’d approve of his comments being removed.
@ Gabriel
That’s the first thing I thot, what exactly does Amazon think they are getting from this deal? (We all know what they are really getting.) Will Kindle be the default e-book reader on Zune and WinMo 7 phones and Windows 7 PCs? Otherwise, I can’t think of a single reason why Amazon thot MS had something they needed. You’d think they would team up with a hardware company like Intel or Sony.
Because Windows control 90% of the desktop market. That’s why Amazon jumped on the Microsoft bandwagon. With web technologies locking in IE use, MS has a good chance of monopolizing the net.
The deal gives Microsoft special access to technology behind the Kindle reader as well as Amazon’s implementation of Linux on servers.
Does this mean others can ask for the Amazon’s Linux source code? Linux is under GPL, which allows unpublished source code for modifications for a private use. By allowing MS to get Amazon’s Linux, then the source code must be available for other open source users, mustn’t it?