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I read this quote from ZDNet today:
"We are on a path--we were on a path and we will stay on that path regardless."

Wow!I can't believe you would commit yourself to a path and never waiver no matter how bad the result. It seems foolish. I guess those saying that Microsoft's only chance is to change the corporate culture and that Ozzie might make that change possible are just fooling themselves.

I also found out from the article that MS had used over half its cash reserve ($31B) in 2007 on dividends and stock buybacks. I guess that was the reason the stock price stayed relatively flat? It seems like a lot of money to spend to support the stock -- certainly not repeatable this year. They have $21B left this year but aren't planning on using it for the Yahoo! mmerger: instead, they are going to BORROW money for the first time in history.

Let me summarize that. Two years ago, Microsoft had something like 60B in cash and short-term holdings with no debt. This year, they are going to borrow money. I'm no financial analyst and know virtually nothing about economics, but this seems really bad unless something radically changes. The stock price won't stay stable at this rate, will it? How can this situation exist with MS continuing to make cash hand over fist the way it always has --- in fact being more profitable this quarter than usual? I'm utterly confused.

Is there some accounting trick going on here to either make MS seem stable or -- on the other hand -- to make the cash seem like less of an incentive for some kind of takeover?

No matter what it means, I guess they're driving on straight ahead, into the icebergs and the enemies.

Damn the torpedoes! Full steam ahead!

Bah! lmer.