Details have been trickling in all weekend about Microsoft's decision Saturday to make good on their threats to take their toys and go home [1] — although we'll likely never get all the pieces of the puzzle, enough have emerged to put together a roundup of how things went down.

Of course, it all began three months ago, when a quiet Friday morning was shattered by the announcement that Evil Incorporated was gunning for Google [2] and planned to use Yahoo to as it's H-bomb. Of course, the intervening months saw plenty of bickering [3] back and forth, and more than enough maneuvering [4] on all sides. Then came Microsoft's big 'get serious' moment [5], with the three-week ultimatum they eventually ignored [6]. That was followed by the sudden and surprising appearance of quitter-talk [7], which is exactly what they ended up doing.

Now, as the dust begins to settle, we hear that the two weren't even playing in the same ballpark [8], a revelation that some of Yahoo's investors aren't too happy about [9]. We've also seen the results the retreat has had on each company's stock price [10]: Yahoo was down almost 15% at press time — but still up from where it was before the bid, and having rebounded $2 from pre-opening trading — while Microsoft was up just under a barely-noticeable 2%, still down from it's pre-bid price in February.

We're beginning to hear the Plan B's [11] and the troop rallying [12]; Jerry Yang's pre-existential perk up for Yahoos [13], promising a brighter, better future ahead, and Ballmer's ballyhoo, committing to take over the internet [14] even without Yahoo. The latter ended with an interesting bit. Quoth the Ballmer: "Now is the time to do what we have always done best--be tenacious, focus on the long term, innovate, and keep working hard." We're pretty sure that's code for "spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt, violate national [15], supranational [16], and international law [17], trample on our competition [18], and just generally do whatever we want with complete disregard for the propriety, morality, or legality of our actions."

Well, at least they'll be doing it alone.
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Justin Ryan is News Editor [19] for LinuxJournal.com.
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