Facebook and Yahoo patch it up ; move forward as ad partners
Facebook and Yahoo have settled a patent lawsuit and are instead moving forward with an expanded advertising partnership.
Deal with Facebook
The agreement is seen as yet another feather in the cap for Yahoo acting CEO Ross Levinson.
The lawsuit was initiated by Yahoo's former CEO, who got the boot in a résumé-padding scandal two months ago.
The settlement allows both sides to use some of the technology that was in dispute, but it also provides for no direct cash payments.
Both companies used glowing terms to describe the arrangement on Friday. The deal provides for promoting and distributing some digital media content -- and potentially showing more users' "likes" or recommendations -- across both companies' websites.
"That could be valuable for both sides if it allows them to share data," Karsten Weide, an Internet and social media expert at the IDC tech research firm, told the San Jose mercury News.
He said the end of the lawsuit amounted to Yahoo telling Facebook: "Oops, sorry we bothered you. It won't happen again."
Yahoo's acting CEO, Ross Levinsoh now appears to be the leading candidate to become Yahoo's chief executive on a permanent basis.
Levinsohn, a former News Corp. executive , led the settlement talks for Yahoo after former CEO Scott Thompson was forced out in May.