I was thinking... why is Google and Microsoft buying multiple ad distribution networks and affiliate companies? These are costing them up to $6 bn, wouldn't it be better for Microsoft to spend $6 bn on some portals, blogs and news websites? That way they can monopolise their own ad networks by stopping adsense on popular websites. I am sure if Microsoft was to buy some top rated Alexa sites which ran adsense which could be worth a few hundered thousand to a few million. I bet the majority of those use adsense and some can be earning millions from adsense, if Microsoft was to stop this on there newly aquired websites, then not only will it bring revenue for Microsoft, but also it will take it away from Google.
that's a very good point... that would be a great business move, but MSFT probably wants successful systems all in place, and isn't worried about shelling out the big bucks. Maybe they don't want to take the time to develop their own network systems, so this is an easy way to do that and gain an audience good post though