Microsoft and Search Engines...

Microsoft unveils cash back search service

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'Radical idea' Analyst Roger Kay of Endpoint Technologies Associates said the Microsoft strategy could help boost traffic through the company's sites. "The cash-back idea is pretty radical, but also as old as the hills: buying the business," he said. "Still, it's likely to be the most effective mechanism yet for stimulating traffic through Microsoft's properties."

It may seem radical to the current selection of search engines, but there has been several attempts at this kind of rewards for searching. Iwon was one that I looked at. Also there was one before (forgot name) that supposedly gave money just for searching but I could never get it to work on any search I was interested in. I do not make many purchases on-line compared to the number of searches I do. When I do make purchases I use portals like https://lty.s.upromise.com/welcome.do?cx=l1 (Upromise) that gives cash back to online purchases.

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He added: "These oil-patch guys have tons of money, but it must be humiliating for the brilliant software types at Yahoo to be pushed around by dudes who don't know a procedure call from a cattle call."

That is funny!

The search-engine dilemma Commentary: What are really needed are new and better services
Much of his points I have already read John C. Dvorak state and I take exception to the idea that something really brilliant did not come to market because of some back room deals. If Google had the next mouse trap-would it not promote it?

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Search engines stink What is really needed are new and better search engines. To be honest about it, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft all stink. We all know this is true. Sure, you can find the major and obvious sites with any of them. But seriously try and find, for example, the best knitting site. Go ahead: Type in the keywords "best knitting site" into Google and tell me which site, out of the 300,000-plus results Google returns, is really the best knitting site. It cannot be done, despite the fact that there must be a best one. A group of knitters might know, or maybe not. It's getting more difficult to find anything with a narrow target using any of these search engines. Recently, I was searching for a Barack Obama citation for an article and could not find it on Google; there were too many results to be useful.

Yes, search engines suck since they are all based on "keywords". The engines can find words but it can not provide a human element to it by determining whether it is random words strewn together or a coherent text. It can't determine if the site is for or against an idea. Search Dick Cheney ,and with Google bombing, 8 out of 10 in the front page are criticisms of him. Anyway, something that does take some of my time in the day to explore these issues.


Microsoft obviously still needs an Internet play

The company needs to do something to get its Internet business profitable and growing faster. One cynical view is that its offer for Yahoo was a pure Machiavellian way to deflect attention from other acquisitions it could be plotting. Any other deals it may do will likely pale in comparison to the hefty price it was looking to pay for Yahoo.

Yes something I have thought about also, but their actions are speaking loudly they want Yahoo. As far as THERESE POLETTI'S view about the regulatory hurdles, I don't see much problems except for the EU which has shown over time a willingness to twist the nose of Mr. Softy.

With search overture, Microsoft gets to the point
I really do not think it is too late for anyone to get into the search engine market especially someone that already has an established name and much of the infrastructure. The issue is whether a better mouse trap can be developed and from above I think so.

"It does mean you don't get swallowed by Google, and Google doesn't effectively become 90% of the market," said Keith Hylton, a Boston University Law School professor. "The whole business of tying up with Google meant advertisers there would shift to Google over time."

I really doubt that Google could ever reach 90% of the market. I could see that happen in a market that has no possibility of innovation, but not in the search market and advertising market now.

Bush Plays the Hitler Card/Pat Buchanan is a Dweeb

Bush Plays the Hitler Card

I consider Pat Buchanan as one of the best commentators and interviewers for conservative causes. But I do have some problems with his thoughts on that article.

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German tanks, however, did not roll into Poland until a year later, Sept. 1, 1939. Why did the tanks roll? Because Poland refused to negotiate over Danzig, a Baltic port of 350,000 that was 95 percent German and had been taken from Germany at the Paris peace conference of 1919, in violation of Wilson's 14 Points and his principle of self-determination.

So since the Poles did not appease to Hitler on a minor territory that they then deserved the invasion? But Buchanan has covered a lot of history without too much substance, so let us explore some more. Gdansk was a "Free City" as described by the treaty and through its history it was under a variety of hegemonic forces including Poland
Image:Border changes in history of Poland.
Now we can see from the maps that Danzig was not part of the continuous territory called Germany. So what did Germany want beyond just a sea port?

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The Nazis demanded the return of Danzig to Germany along with an exterritorial highway for land-based access to the Third Reich through the area of the Polish Corridor. However, when the German Nazi Government secured Soviet approval for aggression against Poland, a decision was made to launch a full-out offensive regardless of any Polish willingness to negotiate successions.

Some of the same issues that face Israel and Palestine over the decades. But the question is why did Poland not feel so much desire to give them their highway and the small territory? It could be because of the lost of their eastern territories as shown in the above map which also played out in the Curzon Line. We also need to put Danzig in some historical perspective by noting the various actions by Germany in the Silesian Uprisings. Since Buchanan brings up the 14 points, which I am not sure why, it should be noted that one point states:

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13. An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international covenant.

Which they considered their "free and secure access to the sea" even if it was a free city.

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Hitler had not wanted war with Poland. He had wanted an alliance with Poland in his anti-Comintern pact against Joseph Stalin.

Kind of silly to say Hitler did not want war. Everyone wants to avoid war, as long as they can get it for free. Why pay? And if Hitler's primary contention was his Anti-Comintern Pact pacts then why did it seem to have nearly everyone he could convince to join but then willing to sign pacts with Stalin? I guess since Britain was "invited" to join his pact, he could have used it to justify their invasion also.

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But the Poles refused to negotiate. Why? Because they were a proud, defiant, heroic people and because Neville Chamberlain had insanely given an unsolicited war guarantee to Poland. If Hitler invaded, Chamberlain told the Poles, Britain would declare war on Germany. From March to August 1939, Hitler tried to negotiate Danzig. But the Poles, confident in their British war guarantee, refused. So, Hitler cut his deal with Stalin, and the two invaded and divided Poland.

Sure it is nice to blame Chamberlain for the Polish defeat but their are other pacts and treaties that were not fulfilled. Most of this history is spelled out in the Western Betrayal of Poland.

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The cost of the war that came of a refusal to negotiate Danzig was millions of Polish dead, the Katyn massacre, Treblinka, Sobibor, Auschwitz, the annihilation of the Home Army in the Warsaw uprising of 1944, and 50 years of Nazi and Stalinist occupation, barbarism and terror. In that same speech to the Knesset, Bush dismissed the idea we could ever successfully negotiate with Hamas, Hezbollah or Iran:

What makes Buchanan think that if they had negotiated over Danzig that there would not have been a war? We have to see what their intentions were and the pattern that was being played out. As Poland already got to see what Chamberlain's proclamations resulted in the formation of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, they were naturally not willing to concede such territories on just the Nazis desires.

But beyond this negotiate or not negotiate questions, you must be assured that the opposing side will adhere to the agreements and whether they can or are willing to renege. Shirley Vian negotiated a deal and helped him out, did it help her? While my example was of evil perpetuated on a personal level, Buchanan also mixes between non-state actors and States. It seems obvious that Nation States and the other groups are going to take different types of negotiations.

Let me proceed to the Nazis and their ideology. What would have satisfied them based on their ideology? Well the first clue is provided in Statements by Hitler and Senior Nazis Concerning Jews and Judaism. Poland was the "killing fields" for Germany {German camps in occupied Poland during World War II}. Lastly, Hitler's Political Views:

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Hitler lived in Vienna for several years, working at odd jobs and absorbing the ideas of Austrian right-wing extremists. In 1913, he left Vienna and moved to Munich in southern Germany. He took with him the basic political ideas to which he would remain committed for the balance of his life. Central to Hitler's thought were his notions of race. He believed in the racial superiority of the Germanic peoples (the Aryan race) and in the inferiority of other races, especially Jews but also Slavs and blacks. Hitler also advocated the Pan-German ideology that was popular among many Austrian extremists. Pan-Germanism held the view that all Germans should be united in a single state. In addition, Hitler was hostile to the ideology of Marxism, which emphasized the unity of the international working class rather than racial solidarity.

So he was asking several states to give up their sovereignty to "all Germans". What makes us believe that other states were not also desired to be split up or dismantled? Heck the USA had a lot more German citizens than that and even a significant number of German born.

Does that last ideology remind us of another ideology?
How Would Iran Read Obama?
The New Appeasers

And for all those out there that do not get the post maybe this will help: Nazi

If We Could Talk to the Animals