Week in review: Jobs went nuclear on Android, Microsoft + Yahoo = huh?

Never let it be said that IT Pro is afraid to combine Japanese haiku with rhyming couplets.

Jobs may be gone

His words live on

MPs conspire

Microsoft throws more money onto the fire

Let's start a war, start a nuclear war!

Steve Jobs may no longer be with us, but his actions and words still cast a long shadow. Snippets of his upcoming authorised biography continue to leak out. Apparently Jobs thought Bill Gates was "unimaginative" and that Barack Obama is heading towards a one-term presidency.

Most interesting of all for the tech industry is his thoughts on Android that he wasn't interested in a financial settlement with Google but wanted the search company to stop using what he saw as stolen Apple ideas in Android. These comments only confirm what we here at IT Pro suspected all along and means the patent war between Apple and Android licensees will only get even more bitter than it is already.

With all these juicy tidbits leaking out, will there be any point in buying the actual book?

Yes Minister

There are plenty of short-sighted, knee jerk reactionaries in this world, but none more so than politicians. We have nothing but thinly-veiled disdain for proposals that would crack down on anonymous online comments.

There are plenty of obnoxious, spam comments online, but this is going too far. Apart from a supposedly business-friendly government imposing more work on ISPs. Imposing restrictions on online communication in an era where that same communication has emboldened corporate whistleblowers, exposed political corruption and helped foster an Arab Spring seems erroneous at best and hopelessly corrupt and self-interested at worst. Well done guys, you deserve a slow handclap. Good job.

Courting is a tricky game

Either Yahoo is even more desperate than we thought, or there's a rumour-mongering analyst out there with a quirky sense of humour. First there was the news that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was relieved Microsoft didn't acquire Yahoo at the height of the credit crunch. Now there are rumours Microsoft could be doing the slow dance of love again, by forming a consortium to buy out the troubled internet company.

We're not sure which would be the least worst corporate buyout partner for Yahoo. Microsoft, a company losing vast sums of money in the hope of gaining market share in online services, or AOL, another struggling internet company.

Bring back Carol Bartz we say. She may not have fared too well during her reign at Yahoo, but at least she could put together a foul mouthed tirade at the drop of a hat. We'd pay good money to see Bartz and Ballmer duke it out. The confrontation would be like asking a gaggle of chimps to write Shakespeare noisy, smelly and ultimately futile.