On Microsoft and LinkedIn

As we started to put together this week's show, one piece of news was showing up all over the tech news. A large tech company bought a social network for, what seems like, an absurd amount of money.

Anyone who follows the tech industry has probably gotten used to stories of one large company gobbling up another, such as Facebook buying the photo sharing app, Instagram, for a billion dollars. Or the messaging service, WhatsApp, for nineteen billion! Even Snapchat bought Bitstrip for over a hundred million, and they just make cute little cartoon pictures to send to your friends.

But this one just felt different. It just felt… can it be said?...kinda uncool.

Microsoft bought the professional networking service, LinkedIn, for just over twenty-six-billion-dollars US.

While other companies, like Google or Apple, seem to be shooting for the next big thing ---- from quantum computers, to neural networks --- LinkedIn, boiled down, is an online rolodex. It's got interest groups and job listings, but at base, it's a way to keep track of people you have worked with or want to work with. To headhunt people and to help look for a job. Useful, at least for some types of careers. But "useful" doesn't exactly make the heart beat faster.

So why did they do it?

In the last few years Microsoft has tried keeping up with next big thing. They created the Windows Phone to compete with Apple and Android and in 2013 bought the mobile phone company Nokia for just under eight-billion-dollars.  

But Windows phones never really took off, and last year Microsoft mostly closed down their mobile phone division.

While Microsoft doesn't seem to have done well recently on the hip consumer market, where they do do well is in business.

If you use a Mac at home, it's still pretty likely you're using a PC at work. Windows is still the standard for offices around the world. And while LinkedIn definitely isn't Snapchat, where it thrives is in the business world.

This acquisition lets Microsoft do things like integrate the network's user information into their email service, Outlook, or their Siri-like personal assistant, Cortana. It makes Microsoft better at the things that it's already is doing well.

So, tech trends notwithstanding, maybe they do know what they're doing, even if what they're doing isn't especially cool.