Gawker: valleywag, strategery

Yahoo to unveil strategy, minus Jerry Yang and Sue Decker

Owen Thomas — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 18:40:00 EDT

Finally, a good idea from Yahoo headquarters! As expected, the company is planning an event to talk about its "open" strategy leading into its two-day Hack Day gathering for developers. (An "open" strategy involves giving developers access to your systems and software so you don't have to come up with any original ideas yourself.) The best part? Kara Swisher reports that CEO Jerry Yang and President Sue Decker will both conveniently be out of town. A Yahoo strategy that involves getting rid of Decker and Yang: This sounds promising.

Yahoo Hack Day next week to reveal company's lack of a plan

Owen Thomas — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:00:00 EDT

Apple's not the only Valley company planning a big event next week. Yahoo's Hack Day, a gathering for developers who want to plug their services into Yahoo's websites, will double as an unveiling of Yahoo's "open strategy." What is this strategy, exactly? An attempt to take on Google and Facebook by making it easier to tap into Yahoo's search index and user profiles. What will be announced? Nothing you haven't already heard about, we expect, but it's safe to predict you'll hear Yahoo executives begging people to build derivative search engines with its Boss service. It's a bit like Tom Sawyer asking other kids to paint the fence for him, except he forgot to bring paint. And a fence.

Murdoch on Microsoft-Yahoo: "There won't be a deal"

Nicholas Carlson — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 12:40:00 EDT

Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang, who says shareholders shouldn't give corporate raider Carl Icahn control of the company because he has no plan other than to sell to Microsoft, got a boost from an unexpected supporter: News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch told reporters at Allen & Co.'s Sun Valley retreat that "in six months, (Microsoft) will walk away." The crusty mogul added: "There won't be a deal. There's bad personal feelings."

Yang himself touched on those personal feelings when he told the Wall Street Journal: "I think that the destabilizing by Microsoft has become more and more intentional. I am not happy about it."

Somebody clue Yang in. Everyone who isn't a Yahoo shareholder is happy to "intentionally" hurt Yahoo for their own personal gain, if that's what it takes. Everyone including Murdoch — who is probably hoping his comments might help keep Yahoo shares low enough for Yang to reconsider his pricey offer to tuck MySpace into Yahoo(Photo by AP/Pizac)

Bewkes to shareholder: Just pretend Bebo is MySpace

Nicholas Carlson — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 12:40:00 EDT

Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes's oops-did-I-Bebo-that tour continues. Yesterday at the Deutsche Bank Media & Telecom conference, a shareholder asked Bewkes how $850 million for a third-place social network jibed with Bewkes's claim that disciplined capital allocation is a key priority for Time Warner. According to PaidContent, Bewkes said, “We did make a bit of a stretch." He then tried to reassure the worried shareholder saying, it was the “same thing when News Corp. bought MySpace.”

If we're the shareholder, we're not calmed. MySpace is far more popular in the U.S. than Bebo. Despite that, ad partner Google still can't figure out how to make money off it. Why doesn't Bewkes just admit it? He had other things in mind when he bought Bebo. (Photo by AP/Peter Kramer)

Yahoo's short-term plan: layoffs and lawsuits

Nicholas Carlson — Mon, 12 May 2008 11:40:00 EDT

A still-independent Yahoo filed a 10-Q with the SEC last week, putting in writing some its current realities as well as its expectations for the coming quarter. Severance packages and other layoff expenses cost Yahoo $29 million in the first quarter. It plans to pay another $15 million in the second. Yahoo also now faces at least 10 shareholder lawsuits following the Microsoft merger negotiations.

If I worked at CNET, this layoff memo would make me want to quit

Jordan Golson — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 18:40:00 EDT

CNET CEO Neil Ashe sent this all-hands memo to explain to his charges the changes that CNET is making to be successful. The memo looks like it came straight out of a Dilbert strip. Ashe says CNET must "embrace change" and "drive greater efficiencies in the business." In addition, a management task force has evaluated CNET's "organization and resource alignment." How about writing a memo in actual English? That seems easier — and a better way to spend everyone's time. At least Jerry Yang's memos had that funny e.e. cummings-esque no-capital-letters charm going for them. Ashe's anodyne euphemisms? They make me glad I don't work at CNET — or any other huge conglomerate for that matter.

You're not the only one confused about Ask; so are employees

Nicholas Carlson — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 16:40:17 EST

Earlier this week, the Associated Press reported Ask.com would become a search engine for midwestern women. But now the "Marge Simpson Plan" — as our Ask tipster calls it — is off. Apparently, Ask CEO Jim Safka changed his mind over the weekend and executives spent all day Sunday scrambling to put together a new plan. Our tipster blames the confusion on Safka's secretive nature, telling us that when he comes into work his office door is always closed. The silence has once loyal employee feeling apathetic and looking for jobs elsewhere.

Nokia jealous of Apple, wants cut of the action

Jordan Golson — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 16:17:51 EST

Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said in an interview with a German paper that Nokia will pursue a cut of subscriber revenues for some future data-based devices. As we've previously noted, Apple has set up a triple whammy with the iPhone: the company gets paid when it sells the phone, gets a kickback from service providers, and gets a cut of content sold through the iTunes store. In October, Nokia rolled out an unimpressive social network and partnered with Universal Music to start its own music store. Apple has shown the rest of the industry that there is money to be made in more than just handsets, and Nokia wants in on the action.

The New York Times writes that although Nokia has had significant success worldwide — almost 40 percent global market share in cell phones — the company has had a tough time adapting to the U.S. market's "idiosyncrasies."

"We felt we could teach the U.S. market how we do business elsewhere ... and ... that failed," says Nokia's Kalla... — screw it, we'll just call him OPK. "Now we just want to act, based on the needs and requirements of the market." If the Finns can roll out a viable services plan — Nokia's $8.1 billion acquisition of mapping provider Navteq may help here — they could redirect revenue from cell providers back to themselves.

The move would have a cost. Why would AT&T or Sprint want to do business with Nokia when Nokia is trying, in effect, to steal their customers? They wouldn't, and Nokia may screw itself over if it presses the issue. OPK was insightful when he said, "Convergence is a nice, dandy word, but it means industries colliding." Good for Nokia shareholders that he is aware of that, but can he act on it? Don't hold your breath. No wonder Nokia wants to encourage "openness" — that's just a fancy label for its free-for-all profit-grabbing services strategy. Good luck screwing over your partners in an industry that requires partnerships to function.

Nokia can't decide who it wants to be

Owen Thomas — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 19:27:57 EDT

WEB 2.0 SUMMIT — Does Nokia wish it were Facebook? Or Apple? Anssi Vanjoki, an executive at the Finnish phonemaker, can't seem to make up his mind. Nokia's introducing Ovi, a "context-sensitive" social network. Oh, and the N810, with which Nokia hopes to horn in on the iPhone's computer-in-your-pocket market. This is, surely, the ultimate bitches-just-jealous corporate strategy. We can only think that Motorola CEO Ed Zander is delighted to hear his rival's getting out of the phone business.