MySpace nabs Yahoo sales exec
Another high-level Yahoo employee has left the building: Valeh Vakili, director of U.S. sales operations, will join News Corp.'s MySpace as senior vice president of sales strategy and operations.
At Yahoo, Vakili was in charge of integrating the sales teams from acquired properties like Right Media into Yahoo's own; at MySpace she will be in charge of the social network's account management team. Vakili will remain based in New York. (MySpace's headquarters are in Los Angeles.)
Yahoo's "executive exodus" has been well-documented, with dwindling search share and a disastrous takeover bid from Microsoft dampening employee morale.
MySpace announced in July the hiring of five new vice presidents, two of whom came from Yahoo--but at the same time underwent company layoffs. Statistics firm ComScore reported in June that MySpace had, ironically, surpassed Yahoo as the biggest destination for display ads on the Web.
Caroline McCarthy, a CNET News staff writer, is a downtown Manhattanite happily addicted to social-media tools and restaurant blogs. Her pre-CNET resume includes interning at an IT security firm and brewing cappuccinos. E-mail Caroline.
