The headline should be changed to "investment" instead of "acquisition". Those are two very different scenarios. I bet against either way, yahoo! is profitable and doesn't "need" the $$. From a search perspective they have the larger share of audience than MSN so it's unlikely they will see a big value in being owned by smaller share msn (if search is what msn is after). The combination of the two does not make any sense since they have very different cultures and combined are still not enough to topple google. If yahoo! could get their house in order I think they could mount an attack themselves through smart acquisitions, however, their track record is poor. Just ask Mark Cuban who got a shiny new NBA team with yahoo! money for video assets Yahoo! divested of (possibly too early now with video taking off).