Gawker: valleywag, deanna brown

Ousted Yahoo exec completes Scripps Interactive turnaround

Nicholas Carlson — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 14:20:00 EDT

Earnings season can bore, but behind some numbers, there's very human drama. Scripps, the home-and-garden media mini-empire, saw profits rise 22.8 percent to $84.1 million in the first quarter, thanks in large part to Scripps Interactive, led by former Yahoo executive Deanna Brown. Her unit swung to a profit of $21 million in the first quarter. A year ago, Scripps Interactive lost $15 million in the first quarter. At Yahoo, Brown, we had heard, choked under the rule of Yahoo media czar Scott Moore, whom some ex-employees called "suffocating." At the time, Brown only told us, "Sorry, not going to get into this." How politic. Numbers speak louder than words, at any rate.

He pushes them out, she does the paperwork

Nicholas Carlson — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 12:31:25 EST

New Yahoo Media czar Scott Moore dropped Yahoo News star Neil Budde from his org chart. Rumor has it he ran Yahoo Food director Deanna Brown out of the company as well; when we asked Brown, now at Scripps, about the incident, she starchily declined to comment. Now we're hearing Moore was responsible for at least one more departure as well.

Girlfriend Teresa Thomas's, that is. Thomas left Yahoo earlier this year when the relationship heated up, according to a source. Moore denies that's why she left. "We never dated while we worked together, period," he said.

In any event, Thomas never reported to Moore. A shame. Imagine the efficiency of such an arrangement. Moore could let his employees know when they've become useless to him, and then Thomas could push them out ever so delicately. Really, couldn't Yahoo could use more synergies like this?

Scott Moore suffocates his workers

Nicholas Carlson — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 08:09:31 EST

Scott Moore's career is on fire. The already overtaxed executive is taking over Yahoo's media division. His role has expanded to include oversight of music, TV, movies, games, and gossip site OMG. But a former Yahoo consultant worries that Moore's out of his depth. "[Moore] is a news guy," our source tells us. "He's not really a traditional product person. Scott doesn't really understand a lot of what's going on in terms of how things are monetized these days." And when it comes to managing talent, he says, Moore has a habit of sucking the oxygen out of the room.

Our source says "really good talent underneath [Moore] tends to suffer." Deanna Brown, for example, left to run Scripps's interactive division — but only after Moore essentially forced her out. "She launched Food for Yahoo under Scott Moore and was completely stifled. She was a talent that everyone around her thought was probably at Scott's level, but he just didn't let her breathe." For his part, Moore now pooh-poohs topics like food as too small for Yahoo, according to PaidContent.

Interesting. Yesterday, we also heard that Neil Budde, the founding editor of WSJ.com and a star hire for Yahoo three years ago, might be finding Moore's management style a bit stifling and may be on his way out, though PaidContent doubts it. Any Moore stories? Yahoos, want to come up for air? Drop us a line.