Yahoo, Microsoft talking partnership for online advertising

The on-again, off-again talks between Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp. about an online advertising deal are reportedly back on.
The discussions restarted a few weeks ago, and included a meeting between new Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, the technology blog AllThingsD said Friday.

The two companies have intermittently talked about partnering in search engine advertising since last year after Microsoft's unsolicited $47.5 billion takeover bid for the Sunnyvale Web portal fell apart. Microsoft executives have championed a partnership as a way to better compete with search industry leader Google Inc. while underscoring that they are no longer interested in an acquisition.