Henry Blodget

Google has been trying to broker an ad partnership with Yahoo!, but tech’s potential power couple just can’t make it work. As predicted, Google called it quits today.

In June, Google announced their agreement with Yahoo!, which gave Yahoo! the option of using Google to supply ads on its Web sites. But after antitrust regulators investigated the plan, they found that the two strongest search engines would crush competition and notified the companies that they'd be filing a lawsuit. "Pressing ahead risked not only a protracted legal battle but also damage to relationships with valued partners," wrote David Drummond, Google’s chief legal officer, on the company’s public policy blog.  read more »

Tim Armstrong, Google's president of sales and crusader for their possible search ad deal with Yahoo, was having a cocktail at the W Hotel at Lexington and 50th Street last night for the Silicon Alley 100. But he wasn't exactly sure why he was there.

A couple hundred of the city's tech stars, from Facebook reps to the heads of tiny start-ups, were munching on mini lobster burgers and chicken paella in little tortilla spoons while slurping mango mint mojitos. Most were on the recently released list of New York's digital A-listers. "There's a list?" asked Mr.  read more »

At yesterday's Times State of the Newsroom meeting, a staffer asked executive editor Bill Keller if the paper was running out of money. Mr. Keller handed the mic over to New York Times President and General Manager Scott Heekin-Canedy who said, definitively, no.

"We have the ability to pay our debt, we're not concerned about it, we're watching it carefully in these credit markets, our liquidity is sound and our pension funds are fully funded and will be all through 2009 and beyond as far as we can see," he said.

The staffer also asked about an item written by Silicon Alley Insider co-founder Henry Blodget that followed this premise with an argument about the Times Company's financial position:

the New York Times (NYT) is approaching the point where it will have to manage its business primarily to conserve cash and avoid defaulting on its debt.  read more »