Broadband Developments

Kara Swisher has the best headlines and is sniffing down the best stories these days.  Here in her blog post she is tracking the Microsoft counterstrike to Amazon in the quest for what I call the LSD awards (Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds).

We have been tracking the Infrastructure 2.0 and Cloud Wars at Broadband Developments (BroadDev.com).   Kara is on to something here.

She writes:

Next week in Los Angeles, Microsoft will kick off its Professional Developers Conference (PDC), a place the software giant likes to unveil all kind of news in a big launchtastic flourish.

For all the noise, it’s worth paying attention, because Monday’s outlook will be cloudy, as in cloud computing.

The day will include a speech from Microsoft’s Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie (pictured here) and others on, among other topics, its cloud infrastructure service initiatives–designed to match aggressive efforts from Amazon (AMZN) in the space.

Microsoft (MSFT) execs will probably be in a good mood, given the decent earnings results the company announced earlier this week for the third quarter. Revenue was up nine percent to $15 billion, even though net profits only increased 1.9 percent to $4.37 billion.

Still, that was a pretty good performance in a down economy, due to strength in Microsoft’s powerful Windows and Office franchises. And despite–as usual–the weakness of its online division.

While the revenue for its MSN, search and advertising network grew to $770 million or up 15 percent in the quarter, operating losses doubled to $480 million from $267 in the same period a year ago. Search grew more than display advertising, a forward outlook Microsoft that maintained.

And still no digital chief, long promised by Ballmer, in sight either. Sources said that head, who will lead the unit, has still not been selected.