Yesterday, during Yahoo's second-quarter earnings call, Sue Decker cited Yahoo's newspaper deal as an example of "how our commitment to being the industry's partner of choice is gaining traction." Her proof? The consortium teaming up with Yahoo now included 17 companies publishing "nearly 400 daily newspapers." Putting together a coalition is one thing; actually making money is quite another altogether. Today, Google announced they are expanding their effort to broker newspaper print ads to more than 225 papers. So is Decker, Yahoo's no. 2 executive, right in touting the number of papers it partners with a a sign of "traction"? It's not that simple. Yahoo doesn't do simple.