Kara Swisher in Media on September 23, 2011 at 4:17 pm PT
Today, Yahoo leaders —
all of them in two different memos — took to the keyboards today to fill their 14,000 employees in on what’s up.
Reading them, Yahoos must be more confused than ever now.
Kara Swisher in News on November 15, 2010 at 12:53 pm PT
A new $10 million micro-venture fund, led by former Yahoo top engineering exec Ash Patel–called Morado Ventures and funded by a group largely made up of ex-Yahoos–is about to launch, according to sources close to the situation.
Expected limited partners in Morado, which means “purple” in Spanish, include former Yahoo CEO Terry Semel, former COO Dan Rosensweig and former sales head Greg Coleman. Ex-Yahoo President Sue Decker is also considering investing, said sources.
Also on deck: Yahoo’s two founders Jerry Yang and David Filo, both of whom are still at the company.
Kara Swisher in News on April 9, 2009 at 3:10 am PT
Last year, Yahoo EVP Hilary Schneider and then-Media Group head Scott Moore had a summery seaside dinner with Demand Media co-founder and CEO Richard Rosenblatt in Santa Monica, Calif., right around the corner from the online publishing company’s HQ.
While many speculated that Yahoo could be doing some friendly kibitzing to get a sense of where the eclectic network of general- and special-interest sites was headed, for a possible acquisition, nothing came of it.
But now, a year later, with recent indications that a major strategy for new CEO Carol Bartz will finally follow through on making Yahoo’s massive but disparate service more social, especially in its content offerings, several sources close to the company tell me another look-see at Demand is likelier than ever.
Kara Swisher in News on February 23, 2009 at 7:30 am PT
On Friday, BoomTown first reported that new Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz is likely to be announcing a sweeping new management structure soon, which can only mean the possibility that some existing top execs are likely to be broomed out, even as some new ones are ushered in.
“This is going to be a full-scale peanut butter recall,” joked one exec, referring to the infamous “Peanut Butter Manifesto,” which was sent around the company several years ago by former exec Brad Garlinghouse. It laid bare the problems at Yahoo, most especially a decided lack of decision-making and lugubrious levels of managers.
Here is the sticky skinny.
Kara Swisher in News on December 13, 2008 at 2:00 am PT
With so many more ex-Yahoos out there now, BoomTown put out feelers to a range of them to ask whom they would like to run the company they no longer work for. After all, who better than to pick a new CEO than an ex? The response was swift and varied wildly, depending on which way the ex-Yahoo felt the company should go, from a basic turnaround expert to–
drum roll, please–his digital Holiness, Steve Jobs of Apple. No kidding.
Kara Swisher in News on October 30, 2008 at 9:19 am PT
Today, a panoply of prominent tech and Internet leaders is taking a very public stand against a controversial initiative before California voters, which would eliminate the current legal right of same-sex couples to marry.
Silicon Valley has had a long history of supporting gay rights. And recently, Google Co-Founder Sergey Brin has made a strong statement opposing Proposition 8, while Apple gave $100,000 to the help defeat it.
Kara Swisher in News on September 18, 2008 at 3:22 pm PT
It used to be, many years ago, that longtime Silicon Valley tech exec Eric Schmidt could work up a very significant head of steam when talking about the thuggish monopolistic practices of Microsoft and its negative impact on the tech industry.
And, for the most part, Schmidt was dead right.
Thus, BoomTown is both gobsmacked and a bit in awe that Schmidt–now sitting atop at the high-tech pig pile as CEO of the powerful search giant, Google–can, with a straight face, make the argument that everyone is wrong to be nervous about its deal with Yahoo to serve some of its search ads, even though the pair make up more than 80 percent of the search market.
Still, at a press conference yesterday, Schmidt went on the offensive to defend the Yahoo deal, which is set to begin in a few weeks, in a most peculiar way.
Kara Swisher in News on August 7, 2008 at 12:43 am PT
Dancing and making a video about dancing is obviously something that elevates Yahoo, which is no small thing in this tough period for the iconic Internet company.
In this video, Blog Editor Nicki Dugan takes the well-known dancing-fool Internet celeb Matt Harding of the Where the Hell Is Matt? Web site and places him all over Yahoo for 33 dancing sessions.
The video was recently shown at the company’s all-hands meeting, and it is simply delightful to see Yahoos looking happy simply by tripping the light fantastic.
I think activist shareholder Carl Icahn should make Harding one of his picks for the Yahoo board.
Kara Swisher in News on August 1, 2008 at 10:23 am PT
While looking for news,
any news, at Yahoo’s annual meeting in San Jose this morning, who should tap BoomTown on the shoulder but a blast-from-the-past Yahoo, former CEO Tim Koogle.
Koogle still has about 10 shares of the stock apparently, and I am not entirely clear why he is here, though I will surely find out what’s what.
But Koogle looks fabulous.
Kara Swisher in News on July 2, 2008 at 10:37 am PT
Like the zombies in “Night of the Living Dead” who will not die, the notion of a big, sloppy deal for Microsoft to buy Yahoo is revived yet again in an article in The Wall Street Journal today.
Unfortunately for both Yahoo and Microsoft, it mostly serves to point out once again just how messy and pathetic the proceedings have been and continues to be.
But, as to the central idea, that Microsoft is aching to do a multi-part deal with various partners that would render Yahoo asunder, BoomTown is altogether dubious that this will ever come to pass.
