Is the ax falling at Ask.com? "There is indeed a big shakeup coming," a tipster tells Silicon Alley Insider, seeming to corroborate layoff rumors we reported earlier.

Some think a reduction in workforce is likely. There are no sacred cows, [Ask's proprietary search technology] may be sold or simply abandoned which is hundreds of engineers who work on the core search engine, in place of just using Google's search with our special brand of user interface.

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