yang

What CEO skills should Yahoo look for?

Yahoo's board and outgoing Chief Executive Jerry Yang agree that his skills aren't the right ones to turn the company around. What strengths, then, should his successor have?

Given Yahoo's sluggish responsiveness and years of trouble, a turnaround expert with a high pain threshold certainly is a good place to start. But there are other options beyond that.

Among the options are a mergers-and-acquisitions specialist who might broker a deal with Microsoft or another partner, a buttoned-down operations expert who could speed up Yahoo's existing strategy, and a bold visionary who could take Yahoo in a … Read more

CNET News Daily Podcast: Looking ahead to a post-Yang Yahoo

Topping Tuesday's news, of course, is the announcement that Jerry Yang will step down as CEO of Yahoo. CNET News reporters Stephen Shankland and Elinor Mills talk about what the executive shift will mean for the company--and for a possible resurrection of Microsoft's acquisition offer.

That, and other headlines of the day, on Tuesday's podcast.

Listen now: Download today's podcast

Today's stories:

Microhoo revisited: Would it be a search-only deal?

Yahoo CEO Yang to step down

DivX sues Yahoo over canceled ad deal

HP sees fourth-quarter sales boost

Google 'Voice Search' hands-on verdict: Awesome

Six cars for your iPod… Read more

Buzz Out Loud 855: The iPhone changes everything

On today's show, Brian Cooley announces that he's made the switch...I mean, the big switch. He bought an iPhone. The world briefly stopped rotating, and when it resumed, we laid down the smack on poor Jerry Yang, the Justice Department, the XM-Sirius merger, and subsequent channel flipping, and some poor guy who thought it was a good idea to call our show. Good times!

Listen now: Download today's podcast EPISODE 855

Yahoo's Jerry Yang to step down, as a search for new CEO commences http://kara.allthingsd.com/20081117/yahoos-jerry-yang-to-step-down-as-a-search-for-new-ceo-commences/ Jerry Yang's entire memo … Read more

The 404 230: Where we've got depleted uranium on justthetip

It's 404 time! Wilson, MTI and the Mantern hijack the show while Jeff tours Canada and Justin suffers from radiation poisoning. With Wilson at the helm, the show starts to sound like NPR, but a few below-the-belt comments from the Mantern get things back on track. We talk golden earbuds (not showers), unarmed German thieves, astronaut fitness and Chinese spies. For the show's second half we gear up for the new Xbox Live Experience that launches tomorrow.

Dan the Mantern here. I must say, I'm pretty excited about the launch of the new Xbox Live Experience. Having canceled my cable subscription because I can't afford an additional gajillion dollars every month to surf 700 channels of crap, I'm hungry for a new way to entertain myself. I can't wait to start streaming to my big screen in full HD. As for the new "avatar" features, I'm petrified. Almost nothing is worse than getting pwned by an 8-year-old in Call of Duty 4 and having to listen to him trash talk. Getting pwned by a cutesy cartoon avatar of an 8-year-old who has a mouth like a sailor? Completely humiliating. Here's to the last hours of a Mii-free Xbox Live.

EPISODE 230 Download today's podcast … Read more

Jerry's perfect. Jerry's our man. Jerry's gone.

Update at 9:12 a.m. PST: Editors note about the Dan Lyons' vanishing blog has been added.

Update at 10:20 a.m. PST: See below for image with full text of Lyons' blog.

Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang is stepping down. My question: why did this take so !%!%!% long?

In Yang's letter to employees, he suggests that he's had an "ongoing dialogue with the board about succession timing." Yet surely the timing was right a year ago, and not necessarily now when Yang and the Yahoo board's intransigence in the face of Microsoft's offer and too-hopeful attempts to buddy up with Google have left the company in a shambles, with no suitors, a miserable stock price, and a bleak future.

Dan Lyons gets it right when he calls "foul" on the entire process in his blog:

Chairman Roy Bostock says it's the right time for this to happen. I only wish you could have been on the phone for my conversation just--what--a month ago, when the same Roy Bostock swore up and down to me that Jerry Yang wasn't going anywhere because he was absolutely the greatest leader the world has ever known. "Nobody knows this company better than Jerry Yang," said Roy. "Jerry is the right person to continue to lead Yahoo."...

The takeaway [from this and other misguided optimism about the Microsoft and Google deals]: Do not believe a word that Yahoo says. Ever.

(Editors note: Lyons' blog is suddenly unavailable on the Web. Valleywag, however, posted the entry in full on Monday night with a prediction that it might be taken down. Lyons is a technology columnist for Newsweek. Also, there is an image with the full text of the blog below.)

The race is on to find just the right candidate to helm the bloody stump that is Yahoo. But Yang has shepherded the destruction of so much company value, both in terms of stock price and in terms of employee morale, that asking a candidate to step in is like asking someone to parachute onto the Titanic.

This is bad for the good people that work at Yahoo, but it's also destructive to the open-source assets that Yahoo had begun to assemble, such as Hadoop and Zimbra. This won't be the first concern for Yahoo, but it's depressing to see so much potential die in the womb.

For the Zimbra folks, in particular, it's sad to see the exceptional work that they created get smudged with the weakening Yahoo brand.… Read more

Yang's travails: A Yahoo timeline

After nearly a year and a half at Yahoo's helm, Chief Executive Jerry Yang will step down once the company finds a replacement. Monday's announcement starts closing a chapter in the Internet pioneer's history that began in June 2007 when Yang replaced Terry Semel as CEO.

It's been a rough time. Yahoo's stock has dropped from $28.12 when Yang took over as CEO to Monday's close at $10.63.

But though Yang didn't build Yahoo into a Google-slayer, he hasn't been idle, either. The company looks very different from when he … Read more

A pity for Yahoo that John McCain didn't win

Unfortunately for Yahoo, Barack Obama's otherwise engaged.

As headhunters from Heidrick & Struggles scroll through the available A-listers for Yahoo's next CEO, they might be excused for secretly wishing John McCain had won the election.

That's because after all this company has gone through, it is going to take some sort of superstar to rally the troops now that Jerry Yang is returning to his former role of "chief Yahoo."

Truth be told, you should be happy for Yang. He no longer has to suffer the indignity of playing the role of human pinata. I … Read more

With Yang out, Microsoft may come back

Updated 8:29 p.m. PST with analyst comment.

Jerry Yang's resignation as chief executive of Yahoo opens the door wide for another Microsoft offer, several sources said Monday.

"I would expect Microsoft to come back within the next three or four months," said Eric Jackson, an activist Yahoo shareholder who was among the investors angry with Yahoo's management for not accepting Microsoft's previous bid. "I think Microsoft will come back because Microsoft needs Yahoo, despite what they've been saying publicly, and I think they know that," Jackson added.

Financial analysts also … Read more

Jerry Yang memo to staff about stepping down

Here is the full text from Yahoo Chief Executive Jerry Yang about his decision to step down to his earlier role as Chief Yahoo.

From: Jerry Yang

Sent: Monday, November 17, 2008 5:03 PM

Subject: update

yahoos -

i wanted to address all of you on the news we've just announced. the board of directors and I have agreed to initiate a succession process for the ceo role of yahoo!. roy bostock, our chairman of the board, is leading the effort to identify and assess potential candidates for consideration by the full board. the board will be evaluating … Read more