Before the bell 05-19-06: GOOG, MSFT, YHOO, EBAY

Stocks look set to rise this morning, as investors worry less about inflation and the dollar (at least for now) and focus instead on comments from Dell Computer, which reported earnings last night.

Dell shocked investors last week when it said it wouldn't meet previous sales and earnings targets mainly because of pricing errors. That set off fears of crippling price wars in the computer industry. But last night Dell (which reported an 11% drop in earnings from a year ago) didn't emphasize price cuts in its plan for bouncing back, but rather said it would start using chips from Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) instead of Intel (INTC). 

Appearing on CNBC this morning, Tony Sacconaghi of Sanford C. Bernstein is bullish on Dell's stock and has a price target of $36 a share.

Here's a look at some key Blogging Stocks this morning:

Google (GOOG) is up $3.81 to $374.80 as of 9:10 a.m. Google properties account for 4.3% of all internet visits, a percentage that's grown steadily over the past few years; however, only Google Images, Gmail and Google News account for more than 1% of Google's market dominance. And Om Malik now has evidence to his theory that "some of the newer offerings weren't really sticking to the wall."

Microsoft (MSFT) is up 4 cents to $22.87 in pre-market trading as of 9:10 a.m. Microsoft tries to jazz their users up by creating a "get ready!" web site. Heh.

Yahoo! (YHOO) is up 16 cents to $29.16 as of 9:11 a.m. Interesting correction in this Reuters story about Yahoo!'s analyst day. Looks like the CFO didn't like the way she was quoted in the original version.

eBay (EBAY) is up 36 cents to $30 as of 9.11 a.m. Maybe Skype is offering free SkypeOut calls with the theory that, the bigger they get, the less likely ISPs will be able to get away with blocking the company's calls.