Possibly, according to this piece in the New York Times.
Microsoft's $44.6 billion bid for Yahoo, pushed by Mr. Ballmer, was hostile. And during a conference call Friday with analysts and in a subsequent interview, he never once uttered the word "Google," referring to the Internet search giant that has humbled Microsoft only as "the leader" in the online world.Mr. Ballmer, 51, is a famously fierce competitor. To him, failure is never an option. "If we don't get it right at first, we'll just keep coming and coming and coming and coming," he said in an earlier interview.
Microsoft's bid for Yahoo is thus a tacit, and difficult, admission that the company did not get its online business right. The bid also represents a sharp departure from Microsoft's well-thumbed playbook of building new businesses on its own. In the past, when Microsoft moved beyond its stronghold in desktop computer software -- and into areas like video games and data-center software -- it has done so mainly with in-house investment, patience and tenacity.
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I think it's a failure. As John Dvorak has said before, it's a failure to recognize their core business, and that's operating systems, not Internet whateverthehellitis. And also a failure to recognize what the Internet is in the first place.