Yahoo's acquisition track record goes beyond unlucky picking, it shows that they can't maintain or grow the services they bought either.

Compare with Google: Maps (Where2), Earth (Keyhole), Waze, YouTube, DoubleClick were all acquisitions they grew to be far larger under Google than they were before.

Disclaimer: I work for Google, although I have nothing to do with acquisitions.

A key problem with some of Yahoo's acquisitions is that they missed the right point of the curve: buying things once they were already Quite A Thing. While this may look like a safer gamble than buying something small that might be a thing and the next big thing eventually, but might be nothing at all next month, getting in late can have two key problems: already being a thing means it commands a high price, and you already have an invested user-base who may fight tooth-and-nail (or simply leave) when you inevitably make changes.

> Actually isn't buying competitors a bad thing from the Anti-Trust point of view?

Anti-trust legislation is scarcely enforced these days. No matter if in the US or Europe.

Interesting, when did this happen? From the outside it definitely seems like it's been their x-ray vision for sure.