Actually, most people don't seem to have realized this, but the mic on Apple's default white headset works for this. One squeeze pauses the current track, a double squeeze is equivalent to "Next", and 3 squeezes is "Previous". That was a lifesaver during the winter when I had no desire to take off my gloves. It's also the reason I haven't felt the need to get better headphones.

Comparing the two over different time frames is not a legitimate comparison. As far as longer term valuation, Google is still out ahead of Microsoft for the past 2 years (Google wasn't around for the entire 5 year comparison).

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=GOOG&t=2y&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=msft