If Microsoft isn't going to marry Yahoo after its alter jitters, says Left On Red author Bill Glynn, then Yahoo better get intimate with AOL if it wants to be in the game.

Yahoo was the pretty girl at the dance a few weeks ago. Although still looking good, it's just not as sexy as the romance the night before. I wonder if Microsoft will just toss Yahoo out of its bed. Would you?

This may turn out to be a casual date. Perhaps it's before-marriage jitters. But moving from full-acquisition Godzilla move, going large, to maybe a deep partnership, is like getting all hot-and-bothered and then having to take the proverbial cold shower. Whatever the outcome for Yahoo, it will either be bought for less value and less upside or end up being devalued in the marketplace. This doesn’t bode well for the search engines like Yahoo or the audience-and-content aggregators like AOL either. It just ends up positioning MSN and Google as the two big monkeys, and everyone else is a piker to be gobbled up.

What does this mean? Well, it means you have a choice: Use MSN or use Google, and expect that your Yahoo and AOL relationship will become theirs. Wonder why I am pointing out AOL? It's obvious that AOL has to get a deal done too in order to be in the game. You know AOL is thinking IPO and go large like Google, but I suspect advisors are aware even with that it will need to be part of the larger winners, MSN or Google.

So I'm calling the shot here: Yahoo and AOL better get hitched and soon. What would be interesting -- and a way to survive -- is if Yahoo and AOL merged. Now that would be a twist of fate, wouldn't it? That's the only way Yahoo will survive in the long run, and a very smart move for both of them.

But isn't Microsoft a great marriage? Yes, of course it is. So is Google. But there isn't any other way out of the box now except, as I described, AOL. The once $34 billion Vegas Show Girl -- like Jane to Tarzan -- will get old real quick. Google has brand now, and is googling up all sorts of users and companies, as it should with $582 dollar share price.

What a great play by Microsoft, though. Imagine the cohones on these guys -- to step right on Yahoo and position themselves as the only game in town other than Google. Awesome play.