The news of Microsoft’s hostile takeover bid for Yahoo has left me surprised, but personally and directly, I’m largely unaffected.

I tend to agree with Google’s contention that this is a bad thing for innovation, competition and transparency on the web … but then, I tend to agree with Google on a lot of things, and I’m a big fan of most Google tools.

I say I’m "unaffected," because I don’t use del.icio.us, Flickr, Yahoo! mail, or any other of their services … but I certainly know plenty of people who do.

I’m not virulently anti-Microsoft by any means. I do think their approach to business is more aggressive and less friendly … but after all, running a business isn’t really about making friends, it’s about making money. Right?

(Hint to Microsoft: some companies think you can do both.)

I was just catching up on some shared blog entries in my Google Reader (thanks, Jay!) and saw a post on One Square Foot . Org.

It’s buying up rainforest land with the money it earns from ad revenues, all while you simply answer trivia questions on their web site.

I like trivia, and I like breathing oxygen. If that describes you too, give One Square Foot a try.

I’ve been using Zoundry for a while to do my blog posting … because I really don’t like posting online. I’ve been burnt one time too many by online editors crashing just before I save something.

A lot of people have been saying that Windows Live Writer is a better option, because it stores your style information … so that as I type, the blog entry actually looks like it will look when it’s posted.

So I’m trying it out.

One thing I don’t like about any of these offline writers is that you can’t really use Wordpress tags. Or at least I haven’t been successful in using them. I can set categories, but I end up posting everything as a draft and then updating the tags online before I publish.

Oh well.