
Google’s Marissa Mayer Tapped as Yahoo’s Chief - sahillavingia
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/07/16/googles-marissa-mayer-tapped-as-yahoos-chief/
======
jbyers
Wow. I am speechless. There is probably no better person on earth to light a
user- and product-focused fire under Yahoo. But the risk, the risk for her is
just stunning. Huge props to her for making the leap from what must be a very
comfortable Google and for the board for finding a stunning candidate to lead
the revival of Yahoo.

(Edit: my definition of risk is lost time and missed opportunity. She's not
going to suffer in compensation or reputation.)

~~~
backspace
I'm sorry but I find it so hilarious. I worked at Yahoo and Google both. I
know both their cultures (and especially the culture at Yahoo after all the
good engineers left). IMHO, she is status quo - no different than the horrible
string of CEOs being hired by Yahoo. In fact, I will put a stake in the ground
that she will not move the needle further than what Scott/Bartz did.

I just can't get over how hilarious this situation is.

~~~
hv23
Curious; care to elaborate from an insider's perspective?

What about their cultures make this situation hilarious, and how come you're
convinced that Mayer won't make a difference?

~~~
drtse4
Not knowing much about Mayer and reading some comments here i have the
opposite question, why Mayer should be able to make a difference?

~~~
wyclif
The biggest factor is not Mayer herself, but again the "wrestling with a pig"
factor mentioned in an excellent observation above. Yahoo! is not a sexy
company.

------
johnnybgoode
Wow, years later, even after her _de facto_ demotion at Google, people still
think she's some kind of product genius?

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1028615>

This is a hilarious situation.

~~~
steve8918
From the description, her behavior reminds me a lot of how Steve Jobs behaved.
If you read the biography, Jobs would often contradict himself, he was
extremely rude, he would cry at meetings, he would hear an idea and say it was
shit, and then the next week propose the exact same idea as his own, etc.

I'm not saying she is at all comparable to Steve Jobs, but it sounds like they
both know what they want, and don't spend a lot of time with what they think
is wrong.

I've said this often, but Jobs was about 50% right and 50% wrong. When Jobs
was wrong, it was usually a small strikeout, but when he was right, they were
monster home runs, which is why people tolerated Jobs' behavior. Mayer needs
to be right a lot more than she is wrong, so I guess we'll have to see how
that pans out.

~~~
tjmc
Not a good comparison. Meyer famously tested 41 shades of blue on Gmail.
Optimising local maxima is hardly innovation. Jobs was more of the Henry Ford
mindset that if he asked people what they wanted they'd ask for a faster
horse.

~~~
steve8918
I guess you didn't read very carefully because I didn't compare Meyer and Jobs
except in the similarities of how their temperament were described. One was
from an official biography, and one from from an anonymous forum comment, so I
take the forum comment with a grain of salt. To be clear, I don't think they
are at all comparable in terms of success or as a visionary.

But since you brought up the testing of 41 shades of blue, I guess you didn't
hear this story about Steve Jobs obsessing over the yellow gradient on
Google's icon on the iPhone.

[https://plus.google.com/107117483540235115863/posts/gcSStkKx...](https://plus.google.com/107117483540235115863/posts/gcSStkKxXTw)

~~~
tjmc
I didn't say Jobs didn't obsess over details. Clearly he did. The difference
is that he knew what he wanted up front rather than testing market reaction to
make decisions. The latter is commonly perceived as the "Google Way" and it's
more about meeting expectations than setting higher ones.

------
VikingCoder
Marissa Mayer (2012-Present)

Ross Levinsohn (Interim) (2012)

Scott Thompson (2012)

Tim Morse (Interim) (2011-2012)

Carol Bartz (2009-2011)

Jerry Yang (2007-2009)

Terry Semel (2001-2007)

Timothy Koogle (1995-2001)

I seriously hope that the Board of Directors has some idea of what they're
doing, because their track record certainly doesn't look like it.

EDIT: To be clear, this wasn't meant as a slam on Marissa. What I meant was
"It looks like the Board has created a toxic environment that no one could
survive."

~~~
wavephorm
I am very curious what goes in those Board of Directors meetings.

Does everyone just sit around asking eachother "What the fuck does this
company do, and how are we still in business?"

Seriously, what does Yahoo do? I don't know, because I haven't been their
website since the 1990's. They obviously don't make software or hardware
products, because I don't own any and have never paid for any of their
products. I have no use for whatever services they might offer because I've
never heard of anyone praising or recommending their services. I honestly
would like to know how Yahoo still exists.

I think Marissa Mayer has a much harder task in front of her than she might
think. Yahoo really doesn't do anything, or have products. How is she going to
improve that which does not exist?

~~~
unavoidable
Yahoo has some good niche products that are doing relatively well compared to
the rest of the company (fantasy sports is one, Flickr is another). To survive
they probably need to do more of those and figure out how to specialize and
monetize the products that aren't stagnating.

~~~
waterlesscloud
Yep. I only go there for Flickr and March Madness. Flickr could use some
innovation, but it does its core mission well enough. March Madness is a
simple task done well.

Used to be on a couple of private mailing lists through their groups, but
those have both moved to private google groups over the years.

You know what I'd honestly like to see them do? Compete with Google, head on.
I think search and ads are both stagnant markets compared to what they should
be. I would absolutely love to see her knock Google out of its complacency and
get those worlds moving forward again.

She could pull the talent together to do it, I think, if she was bold enough.

The problem is I'm not sure she's bold enough. But Yahoo absolutely requires
gigantic boldness. It's the main quality they need at the top, honestly.

~~~
simonswords82
I can't stand Flickr, the moment I see the two loading animation of a Flickr
page I reach for the back button.

------
yumraj
Historical precedent: Stephen Elop was head of Business Division at MS before
he became Nokia CEO and then Nokia fully fell in MS's lap.

Prediction: Sometime in near future some sort of very close partnership will
happen between Google and Yahoo, subject to regulatory approval of course.

Edit: Fixed "MS CEO" to "Nokia CEO" typo. Thanks kreilly

~~~
dexen
Came here to say just that.

Another prediction: such partnership won't help Google very much, but will
hurt Microsoft a bit -- due to Yahoo shying away from Bing and possibly MS
e-mail technology.

It may also well help developers -- Yahoo's YUI is a very handy and very
relevant toolkit; with Marissa as the CEO, I sure hope Yahoo will embrace
developers more and YUI will get some more love.

~~~
peetahb
I was discussing the same topic with my coworkers when we heard the news.
Yahoo's YUI could be the company's starting point at developing strong
products and boosting Yahoo's relevance as a brand. It's a great library.

------
ryanwaggoner
This might be a stupid question, but are there any amazing turnaround stories
in the world of large tech companies? If not, is that due to the relative
youth of the sector, or something fundamental? I can think of a ton of
companies that have faltered, but really none that have made a dramatic
turnaround.

~~~
smacktoward
Apple kind of leaps to mind.

This is where they were the year Jobs returned, remember:
<http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/gadgetlab/wired+cover.jpg>

~~~
ryanwaggoner
Wow, I feel stupid now. Maybe I didn't think of Apple because it was an
original founder returning and fixing things?

~~~
smacktoward
Don't feel stupid! It doesn't happen very often, really. Certainly the
examples are few and far between. Turnarounds _can_ happen, they just usually
don't.

~~~
ams6110
Interesting observation. Most startups fail, and most turnaround efforts fail.
Makes success something you _really_ want to hang on to when you find it.

------
richardv
Can someone explain how she is able to do this? Set aside the boldness of the
move, but if _anyone_ ever should be put on some kind of "garden leave" or
some kind of non-compete it would be a person moving from a prominent position
in Google to become CEO of Yahoo?

Anyway, that aside. One thing that I hope that comes from this, is bringing
some of the same Google-quality-developer-friendly-ethos to Yahoo. Dispite
consuming several Yahoo services, I'm always disappointed at how slow they
release changes... and if there is one thing that Yahoo needs it's changes..

\---------

[] June 16th, "Marrissa Meyer Makes Move to Yahoo",

[] June 20th, Yahoo switches from Bing to Google Search.

[] July 21th, Bing sees enormous drop in QPM.

Coup of the century? Who would of thought, should this actually happen, it
would be the best possible outcome. Sacrificing the queen to totally dominate
the search market even further.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Sure, there isn't really an enforceable non-compete in California, its one of
the things that makes Silicon Valley, well Silicon Valley. Second there is a
sort of hubris around 'the best revenge is beating them at their own game.' I
know of at least two founder/co-founder pairs that split over different ideas
about how the vision should go and rather than try to sue the other out of
existence, the sense of invulnerability or desire for competition gives rise
to a sort of 'bring it on if you got it' mentality.

~~~
pwaring
Even if non-competes are enforceable, sometimes it will make more sense for a
company to let an employee go straightaway anyway, rather than having them
hang around twiddling their thumbs with no motivation.

~~~
ChuckMcM
True, Where California's statutes affect innovation is in the case where
you're trying to raise money. In a state that enforces non-compete agreements
you have a harder time if your new venture competes with the place you just
left. That is because there is a risk that if you're successful you will be
sued by your original employer and shut down. This is not true in California
so it is nominally easier to raise funds.

~~~
pwaring
How enforceable are they in other states? I know in the UK there have been a
few test cases which seem to have resulted in the interpretation that you can
only enforce one if it would otherwise be detrimental to the ex-employer (e.g.
starting a new business or taking your contacts with you), otherwise people
would find it difficult to move jobs within an industry because you'd almost
always be going to a company who could be classed as a competitor.

------
shawnee_
Doug Crockford gave a great keynote address at the HTML5 conf this year titled
"What would Crockford do?" It was basically not about HTML5 and all about what
he'd do if he were Yahoo CEO.

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cukFl7gpjE> (Crockford takes the stage ~5:09
)

~~~
feronull
he would fork a Node.js and made Ynode :)
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HzclYKz4yQ&feature=playe...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HzclYKz4yQ&feature=player_detailpage#t=1360s)
~22:40

~~~
dmpk2k
Why?

~~~
roopeshv
see the video for the answer

~~~
dmpk2k
I saw the video. It seems a very silly thing to do -- ever since I first saw
that video I've been trying to understand Crockford's angle, and I just
cannot. However, feronull seems in favour of it, so I'd like to know why.

Forking a project isn't a healthy thing to do, unless there's something
seriously wrong with the existing community (e.g. XFree86). As far as I can
tell:

* The nodejs community is healthy and vibrant.

* There are no systemic problems with contribution.

* Isaac Schultner has his head on straight, has reasonable priorities, and is a pleasant character.

* Much, if not most, of node's development is happening outside Joyent anyway.

* Nothing is stopping Yahoo from contributing to the existing project.

Even if all of the above were false, why does Crockford think the remnants of
Yahoo's engineering can do better? Joyent is filled with Sun's top talent, and
the engineering division is run by an enlightened alpha engineer.

I cannot help but think this is a case of sour grapes by Crockford, because
there just doesn't seem to be a good reason for his stance.

Edit: as an aside, his idea of rewriting everything in node is a bit
ridiculous too. I've been a part of several projects to rewrite code, for
smaller things than all of Yahoo's online assets, and it sure took longer than
one year to do a good job even with excellent engineers. This is a long-term
project, not something you do to fix the immediate bleeding. This, and forking
node, are very strange things to focus on right now given Yahoo's
difficulties.

~~~
chimeracoder
> Forking a project isn't a healthy thing to do, unless there's something
> seriously wrong with the existing community

Or you have goals which are substantially different from the goals of the
original project.

Lets not forget that parts of Android are 'forked' from Linux (and were later
merged back).

~~~
tmzt
Not quite, Android's non-hardware specific parts are more of a patchset. The
kernel is still Linux.

------
steve8918
Wow, what an incredible coup.

I've always admired her, she seems to be very smart and has her finger on the
pulse on what the Internet is all about, so if anyone can turn Yahoo around
it's her.

I sincerely hope she has the intestinal fortitude to do WHATEVER it takes to
revitalize Yahoo. The first thing I would do is get rid of the entire board of
directors, they need a complete reboot as well.

~~~
tatsuke95
> _"so if anyone can turn Yahoo around it's her."_

Do you _really_ believe that? I mean, of _all_ the potential candidates out
there, she has the best pedigree?

I think the negative commentary stems from there. You think this is a coup. To
me, it's sort of a ho-hum, predictable hiring. Yahoo! needs an overhaul as a
business, and to do so they hired someone with SV name power.

~~~
steve8918
I 100% believe that she has the best pedigree of any person out there.

Think about it, who would you have as CEO of Yahoo? John Chambers? Larry
Ellison? The CEO of Hulu? Mark Hurd? Jerry Yang? Tim Cook?

I think Mayer is better qualified than anyone else that is available because
she is an expert on the space. When she joined Google, the mainstream Internet
was less than 5 years old. Her entire career has been built on the Internet.
If she went to any large company like IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, Cisco, EMC, you
name it, I would think it wouldn't be a good fit, because she wouldn't be an
expert on the space.

Mayer has been with Google since practically the beginning, and as an
executive, she has participated in the decisions and actions required to
create and maintain a world-class engineering organization. As well, being an
early employee and not just surviving but _thriving_ , I'd be willing to bet
that Mayer has done more as an engineer than most engineers at Yahoo, except
maybe Filo, so that gives her incredible technical legitimacy. So, yes, I
believe she is extremely qualified to run a company like Yahoo.

You can't just stick a "turnaround expert" in the shoes of Yahoo CEO and
expect a great result. You need someone that understands the space, and can
make the tough and right decisions that can put Yahoo back on track. Everyone
that they've chosen as CEO since Yang just felt like they were trying to
salvage as much of Yahoo as possible, and sell it to some other company or PE
fund, and give up. By choosing Mayer, it means they are serious about trying
to put Yahoo back on the right path again, and not just selling it off. I'm
pretty sure this will motivate the current troops at Yahoo.

The only other interesting choice for CEO might be Reed Hastings, but he's
taken already. The Yahoo board could have elected to try to acquire Netflix
and put Hastings as CEO of the combined company, which would have been
interesting. I still prefer the choice of Mayer though, because it shows a lot
of guts, both on the part of Yahoo and Mayer.

~~~
tatsuke95
> _"I think Mayer is better qualified than anyone else that is available
> because she is an expert on the space. When she joined Google, the
> mainstream Internet was less than 5 years old. "_

You do know there's a world of business outside the Valley, right? I'm not
implying that she wouldn't be a good fit and very capable at many jobs or
positions. But Yahoo!'s days are becoming numbered. When I think about what
she could have possibly experienced at Google versus what Yahoo! needs as a
company (which is a corporate and strategic overhaul), I can't understand
where she'd have obtained anything remotely like "turn-around" expertise.
Yahoo! is going to require some outside-the-box thinking, and this hiring is
about as inside-the-box as it could be (along with every other name you
mentioned would have been).

But this is just one man's opinion. I hope she can pull it off; it'd be a
great story.

> _"You can't just stick a "turnaround expert" in the shoes of Yahoo CEO and
> expect a great result. You need someone that understands the space"_

Why can't you? What exactly _is_ Yahoo!'s "space"? Of all the poor decisions
made by Yahoo! of late, why do you trust that this was suddenly a stroke of
genius?

------
lobby7nerd
This will be interesting. She has three big challenges - with little prior
experience in each:

1\. Running a public company is vastly different and considerably more complex
than managing large teams. She has to build an executive team capable of
executing on all fronts. This is beyond hiring the best engineers and product
managers, it is about hiring a CFO, COO, GMs, VPs, etc. that can execute on
the plan set out by the CEO.

2\. Managing a stagnating business requires different skills than a rapidly
growing business. Google benefitted from exponential growth in usage, users,
revenue. Yahoo is already over the hill. Most incoming CEOs do a top-down
review of the business to understand assets and liabilities. They visit
customers and large investors. In the end, they have to present a credible
plan to the BOD for refocusing the business. Where should you invest or
divest? Should you be aligned along product lines, geographically, or along
customer segments?

3\. Yahoo needs deep tech investments - to do so, it must attract and retain
brilliant engineers. It is my understanding that Ms. Mayer's focus at google
has been product and not technology. Without proper engineering, the best
product ideas will fizzle. How will Ms. Mayer attract the best engineers to
Yahoo? Without growth, it is hard to convince the best engineers to join your
shop.

------
simondlr
"Ms. Mayer resigned from Google on Monday afternoon by telephone. She starts
at Yahoo on Tuesday." - That's quick.

~~~
smokinn
For the rank and file 2 weeks is standard.

For upper level executives as soon as you resign you're escorted out the door
by security and you're not allowed to touch anything. The level of access you
had was so high that they don't want you learning anything more about the
company's plans and want you out asap.

I doubt anyone cared that she resigned by phone.

~~~
raverbashing
She should have done it by G+ hangout

(my opinion)

~~~
jtbigwoo
Or Yahoo 360. What? It never launched? Well, she could do it on Yahoo Mash.
Huh? Got shut down? Or she could post a link on Yahoo Buzz. What's that? Also
dead? Crud, maybe she could post it to facebook.

~~~
tmzt
First acquisition (or partnership) should be meetings.io

------
yock
Is it possible that Yahoo is just too far gone to be helped? Her head must be
filled with dozens of ideas for changing the corporate culture there, but
would any of us honestly believe anything could save Yahoo at this point?

~~~
petercooper
There's another way to look at it. With $1bn of net income in 2011, Yahoo! can
clearly turn a profit.

Could any of _us_ here on HN forge a great, long term business from a profit
stream of hundreds of millions of dollars? I'm sure quite a few could, and
Meyer surely stands a good chance.

Even if she has to turn the organization upside down, make major branding
changes, or fire key staff, Yahoo! has the _resources_ , at least, to change
for the better. It has just lacked the willpower, till now hopefully.

------
cft
That's might be really good news for Google users: I think products that she
used to run, like local business reviews on Android maps have a new chance
now.

~~~
endtime
Care to elaborate?

------
ebbv
Clearly she's done good things at Google, but I think the chances of her being
able to right what's wrong at Yahoo! are very low. Best of luck to her.

------
bobsy
Its a great coup for Yahoo.

I think Yahoo's problem is the fact that its search side of things has
collapsed. Primarily it was this that made the company so big. Now that search
has effectively collapsed they don't appear to have a core product.

This means the question "What does Yahoo! do?" can't really be answered.

If you ask that question of Google. You answer. Google is a search engine
which also does...

If you ask that question of Amazon. Amazon is an online store which also
does...

With Yahoo? Yahoo.. owns a bunch on interesting products? It has no core and
without a big central product to build around it has been hard for successive
CEO's to actually drive the company forward.

I have no idea what Mayer can do to resolve this.

------
mtgx
When does Yahoo's contract with Microsoft for the search engine expire? 2014?
I think she will quickly switch to Google search engine after that. And there
goes half of Bing's market share.

~~~
elsewhen
It's a 10-year contract that expires in 2019:
[http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2052024/Its-Official-
Mi...](http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2052024/Its-Official-Microsoft-
and-Yahoo-Finally-Strike-Search-Deal)

------
Gaussian
She did the right thing. I think she had peaked at Google.

She risks "failure" at Yahoo, but that's why this is the right move. What was
she to do at Google -- just drift along as the cofounders continue to
(rightly) control the company?

I've never been a huge fan nor a detractor of Mayer, but I'll be rooting for
Yahoo now. It's about time for another epic comeback story in SV. Long odds,
but that's why this is fun.

------
dkrich
One thing I'm wondering as I read this is whether there has ever been a
successful turnaround at a dot com company before. I can't think of any. If
anybody can think of one, I'd be interested to hear it. I think Yahoo is still
going to shrink a great deal, but that has little to do with their CEO. You
can't expect one person to reinvent a company that does not have typical
operations. By that I mean you can't improve processes or introduce vastly
better products. Yahoo's only chance at growing is to expand into new product
lines. That's why I don't necessarily think Mayer is a great match. I would be
far more interested if a Tim Cook type had been chosen. Not because of the
ties to Apple, but because of his expertise in operations and real business
experience.

------
bcn
_Ms. Mayer resigned from Google on Monday afternoon by telephone._

That must have been an interesting call (to Larry?) to make...

~~~
codex
Especially given that Larry has lost his voice.

~~~
parsa28
that only makes it more awkward...

------
the_researcher
If I'm not mistaken she has been in charge of Google Local for a while. This
is an awful, awful product. Buggy as hell, ugly, and absolutely no inspiration
or cleverness anywhere to be found. If that product was truly her
responsibility, God help Yahoo.

~~~
nostrademons
She was in charge of Geo, which is a broad product area that includes Maps,
Earth, Local, Street View, Maps for Mobile, Zagat, etc. Local may suck, but
most people think Maps is pretty good.

~~~
the_researcher
Maps was great when she took over. Local was very important because the push
was to get all businesses using Google Local (this is why they promoted it to
the top of all search results, etc, and why they tried to buy Yelp).

Despite the obvious value to them, the product was and remains very poor.

------
sas
I'm really surprised nobody has mentioned the Glass Cliff
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_cliff>

"women are more likely to occupy positions that are precarious and thus have a
higher risk of failure - either because they are appointed to lead
organizational units that are in crisis or because they are not given the
resources and support needed for success"

------
rokhayakebe
It was quite clear that the only way she could move up and grow would be to
either start a new company, and what would that be that after Google, or
leading another huge company. Great choice, I am rooting for her, and for
Yahoo.

------
richardjordan
This is just brilliant news for Yahoo. Much as they have become a figure of
ridicule in Silicon Valley, I have hoped year after year to see a Yahoo
resurgence. This is finally a real chance at a turnaround.

Of course now we have to see if potential acquirers (particularly those going
up against Google) suddenly see Yahoo as a much better target if they can get
Mayer in the deal. (MS, FB, I'm looking at you!)

------
floatboth
I hope she'll sell all that search and mail junk to Microsoft and turn Yahoo
into the Flickr company.

Flickr is profitable and awesome!

------
mikeflynn
I'm just gonna leave this right here:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcSujceZDmg>

~~~
mikeflynn
Downvotes? Aww, you guys need to lighten up!

------
HardyLeung
Marissa Mayer: "it was a reasonably easy decision" ...

This is probably what went through her mind... If Larry can lead Google, and I
being the smarter one of the two ...

Despite all her flaws, she may actually succeed at Yahoo! just to prove her
critics wrong. So congrats, and best of luck!

------
marcamillion
This may be a silly question...but is Mayer now legally obligated to liquidate
her Google stock position?

I would assume that owning a large amount of stock of one of your major
competitors, as the CEO, could create some conflicts of interest for
shareholders...no?

I am not insinuating that this is some sinister plot by Mayer to boost her
Google stock holdings - I don't think there is anything she could do at Yahoo
to do that, other than possibly shift their entire ad budget to Adwords...but
even that.

Either way, I would love to know those sorts of 'quirky' implications on such
a decision.

Especially given that the vast majority of her compensation is now in Yahoo
stock.

I also wonder if it would be a 'legal' issue, or a moral issue.

------
dave1619
Congrats goes out to Marissa Mayer. I don't know her reputation inside Google
but from the interviews I've watched of her, she seems very articulate and
focused. Hopefully she can help Yahoo with clearer focus and better execution.

------
sanj
Marissa is one of the few people that can give Yahoo! any sort of chance at
success.

I wish her luck.

------
velodrome
I think she is very capable of turning Yahoo back into an engineering-focused
company. Best of luck.

~~~
kanamekun
Was Yahoo ever an engineering-focused company?

[http://blog.phanfare.com/2009/07/its-official-yahoo-is-a-
med...](http://blog.phanfare.com/2009/07/its-official-yahoo-is-a-media-
company-microsoft-is-a-technology-company/)

~~~
smacktoward
Yahoo's roots were actually in a _rejection_ of engineering.

For years their primary product was their human-curated directory of Web
sites. It was popular because the quality of results returned by the
algorithmic search engines of the time (HotBot, Lycos, AltaVista, etc. -- you
young 'uns in the crowd may need to look them up) were so poor that you had
better odds of finding what you were looking for in Yahoo's directory. The
directory left out vast numbers of sites, of course -- that was the cost of
trying to manually maintain an index of the Web as it exploded in size. Human
curators couldn't keep up with that growth; only software could. But Yahoo bet
that software would never be as good as humans at finding the site you were
looking for.

Then Google came along and built software that could index the whole web _and_
return relevant results from it, and that knocked the bottom right out of
Yahoo's manual-curation approach.

------
jdevonport
Wonderful news, I actually have optimism about Yahoo's future for the first
time in years.

Now the whole board needs to go - there is no question about that.

------
sandycheeks
I'm optimistic as long as she is given enough freedom to do what she wants to
do.

Wonder if there will be a "Why I Left Google" blog post :)

------
sajid
It will be interesting to see what happens at Yahoo now that someone who
actually knows what they're doing is at the helm.

------
jusben1369
I guess Yahoo just became a tech company again not a media one. This is
actually a brilliant move. YHOO's biggest challenge is retaining quality
developers. Developers will feel way more inclined to either a) Stay or b)
Think about joining than they were under the previous several leaders.

------
j2labs
This is so exciting. I can't wait to see what she comes up with. Everyone is
gonna benefit from this.

------
arrowgunz
I am so happy for Yahoo! Hope she gets Yahoo! back to the place where it
deserves to be.

------
tk999
Here is what she will do:

1\. Cut. Cut as much as possible. 2\. Refocus on mobile. May be partner with
nokia or microsft or other falling company to provide default content to other
platform 3\. When yahoo is stable enough. Sell or merge the company.

~~~
TWAndrews
Why would you bring in someone like Mayer to do that? Any MBA type could do
that.

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varunsaini
I believe this change of guard might open a possibility of future Yahoo buy
out by Google. I feel that it will be very hard for Yahoo to survive and
future sale will be an option. In that case, Google might have an upper hand.

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aespinoza
This is amazing news. I think Marissa Meyer is the first potential savior of
Yahoo! I am excited about this, I think we'll start seeing a set of good
things come out of this decision. Big loss for Google though.

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duncan_bayne
I swear I read that headline as 'trapped' not 'tapped'.

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rush-tea
This move would be similar to Sanjay Jha moving from Qualcomm COO to Motorola
Mobility CEO. Look at what happened now. Sanjay Jha not only got a nice
compensation package from Motorola Mobility but also a great deal from leaving
the CEO at MM after Google acquisition and another reputation to boot as being
the one who revive Motorola from zero to hero (being acquired)

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CodeCube
I wonder if this means Bing is out and we'll see a new partnership with Google
in the coming months. If so, it's a total ninja takeover :)

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spaghetti
Trying to think of explanations for this. First thing that comes to mind is a
Dilbert cartoon where the new CEO takes over to run the company into the
ground. While Yahoo's news, shopping, maps and search traffic is probably only
a fraction of Google's it's still worth something. Why not install an insider
at Yahoo and slowly help the traffic move over?

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grsites
Better to rule in hell than to serve in heaven.

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Zenst
I've not dealt or indeed met her so I can't realy comment much beyond from
what I have read that she certainly will not be any worse than what they have
had before.

One tip I will give, whoever is CEO of Yahoo, vote the board out as they seem
to make alot of bad mistakes and will only end up blaming you for them.

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orenmazor
I read that as Trapped

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railswarrior
Turning around yahoo - a big corporation like that is like changing an old
mans behaviour who has been set in his own ways. Mayer though showed success
at google has less chances to succeed . Nevertheless considering her
experience on search she wouldn't have made a better choice .

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jagtesh
Brilliant move! So they finally managed pull out a rabbit out from their ass.
Jokes apart, Marissa is an excellent product manager and a strategist, and
with her kind of experience at Google from it's good old days till now - she's
just the flu shot that Yahoo needs.

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aneth4
Her first priority should be to restore Flickr as a leader in photo and video
sharing. With her "coolness" factor at the helm (even though personally I
don't think she's that cool) this is possible, and the world would be a better
place for it.

Flickr is Yahoo's best long term asset.

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wcdolphin
$100 says Yahoo is acquired by Google in the next three years. Any takers? I
am imagining/hoping for a more successful version of the Stephen Elop leaves
Microsoft, runs Nokia, forms a strong partnership with Microsoft. But this
time, Yahoo is even more in the pits.

~~~
SkyMarshal
I'll take the other side of that bet. Yahoo has nothing Google needs, and
won't within 3 years, even with Mayer reforming it.

There's also a cost to acquisition beyond just the monetary - organizational
and cultural namely. Not worth it for Google.

~~~
MartinCron
_Yahoo has nothing Google needs_

Flickr+Picasa=I might actually use Google products in a social way.

~~~
jpadkins
merging two good products does not make a great one.

~~~
MartinCron
Flickr _is_ a great product, it's more like having google plus riding on
Flickr's coattails.

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pmmucsd
Majority of people surveyed who are familiar with Mayer think she will turn
Yahoo around:
[https://www.google.com/insights/consumersurveys/view?survey=...](https://www.google.com/insights/consumersurveys/view?survey=hwzvifanwr5xu)

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roadnottaken
If she tries to make Yahoo be exactly like Google circa ~2007 it will be a
massive success.

~~~
Tobu
How so? They have to compete with the current Google.

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jacksonmohsenin
She should start with a new logo.

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j45
While I don't care much for Yahoo or any brand, I love seeing someone who
seems to have been over looked for a long time get a chance, albeit with a
less than ideal situation but that's half the fun -- doing what others say
can't be done.

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tathagatadg
[http://techcrunch.com/2012/07/16/marissa-mayer-the-first-
eve...](http://techcrunch.com/2012/07/16/marissa-mayer-the-first-ever-
pregnant-ceo-of-a-fortune-500-tech-company/) \- Respect.

~~~
bluetidepro
It will be very interesting to see her juggle a pregnancy and being a new CEO.
I wonder if she goes "MIA" for a bit after she has the baby.

~~~
melissamiranda
Pregnancy doesn't really affect your ability to work (except for complications
that require bedrest, and even then you work from home). A newborn does
require care from the mother, but many women are able to return to work full
time after 6 weeks (and some as early as 3 weeks). She'll probably be on leave
for a few weeks after baby arrives, but I'm sure she'll be able to keep an eye
on things even while she's gone (this is why the night nurse was invented).

A baby and a career are not mutually exclusive, I just wish people would stop
assuming that they are.

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SoftwareMaven
Yahoo! needs to decide if they are a content company or a technology company.
I'm not sure which is the right one, but I think Mayer has shown she can focus
and can get other people to focus as well.

------
programminggeek
So she was head of Search at Google at one point right?

I wonder what it would be like to become CEO of a company who has outsourced
their whole search and advertising stack to Bing.

Will Yahoo! start caring about search or ads again?

~~~
polyfractal
I wouldn't bother. They are so far behind both Bing and Google that trying to
play catch up in the search game is simply a lost cause.

They have significant traffic and brand loyalty for certain services (finance,
sports, etc). They need to focus on that, not chase a game they lost ages ago
(search).

~~~
j_baker
Just because they've "lost" search doesn't mean they can't make money off of
it. Opera "lost" the browser market a long time ago and is still making money.

~~~
jusben1369
I'm not sure that's the analogy she would have used to wow the Board. Yahoo
has a totally different audience that spends a lot of time on their site
consuming content in a very different way than say Google or Bing. The
opportunities for them to monetize them are very different but no less
exciting. Yahoo has just struggled with a) determining which ones are
strategic, b) enhancing those ones and c) creating a smoother experience
between those. Sounds like a role for a very solid product manager to me.

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pjg
This is definitely stunning news. Marissa of all the people. All I can say is
- wow! Time will tell where this leads to, but hey if anyone has the charisma
to pull off miracles Marissa is the one.

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jroseattle
Wow, this is so crazy it just might work.

I'm not sure _what_ Yahoo would look like in succeeding under Mayer as CEO,
but I have to imagine it would be substantively different than what it looks
like now.

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brainsqueezer
I allways think that Yahoo should split in two, a media/content company and a
tech one.

Why? Because now it's a two head horse, and each head wants to go it's way but
the other head goes opposite.

What do you guys think?

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klawed
I'm genuinely surprised that no-one's discussing the possible acquisition of
yahoo by google as a result of this. Or is that naive? Or cynical? Or perhaps
just dumb...

~~~
dspeyer
Seems unlikely to me. The Motorola acquisition took forever to get through the
EU, and that's a different industry. The legal burden of acquiring a major
direct competitor like yahoo would be more than the company was worth.

------
jc123
Wonder if they also asked Sheryl Sandberg? Seems that she would be another one
to move given that Zuck is probably going to be CEO for a long time.

------
josephcooney
Her twitter profile now says "@Yahoo". And her and her partner are expecting
their first child, due October 7th. Exciting times for them.

------
redwood
Guessing she's saying... "First thing we're doing is adding threading to
email"

Or... "Internally, we're going to use Gmail for corporate work, Yahoo!"

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benjaminwootton
Wow that really is an audacious move from Yahoo!

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narad
My thoughts goes like this....

Down the line, Yahoo will sell itself to Google. Just like EDS was sold to HP.
Consolidation is on the horizon.

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Xavura
I thought Yahoo! was a dying brand, why would anyone want to leave Google of
all places for them at this point?

~~~
spaghetti
Yahoo is dying but it's not dead. All that remaining traffic has to go
somewhere. Google has a clear incentive to take that traffic for themselves
instead of letting fb or someone else have it.

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loceng
I wonder if this was apart of the Kevin Rose acquisition, who seems to have
somewhat of a holistic understanding of local. Google better find someone
equally amazing to replace her though, and fast.

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grandalf
Wow this is very huge. Look out Google!

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jasonlingx
Might just be a new beginning for Yahoo

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StacyC
I don’t even know what Yahoo does. I never use that site, except for a couple
crappy-looking Yahoo groups sites.

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pgrote
Google has to sue Yahoo!, right? She has to be walking away with trade secrets
for local and search.

~~~
r00fus
Good luck in California - worker's rights here are pretty hard to attack.

There's a possibility this is a coup by Google - if Yahoo defects to Google
search engine it's nearly checkmate for Bing.

Remember, Melissa and Page were once a thang:
<http://gawker.com/152210/editorial-googles-power-couple>

Regardless, I wish the best for Yahoo and Marissa. It would be good to have a
strong Yahoo back in the scene - lots of incredible talent there.

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threepointone
Calm down, everybody.

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adventureful
This will play out much like Armstrong at AOL. Lots of flailing around,
another attempt at altering Yahoo's trajectory, and ultimately a further
devalued company (not specifically because of anything Mayer will do, but
because there's nothing that can stop Yahoo's erosion).

At some point the conclusion needs to be reached that the core of Yahoo is the
problem. The products that generate the bulk of their sales are at best
stagnant with no growth left, and at worst are slowly collapsing. Once that's
properly digested, the company then needs to be blown apart and liquidated to
the highest bidders.

Maybe there's a smaller core that could be focused on as a source of
innovation and growth, but it's definitely not what makes up the bulk of
Yahoo's $20 billion market value. If the goal is to generate shareholder
value, Mayer should focus on getting her hands around an engine of growth that
she can really add value to; a smaller Yahoo where she can drive a few growth
products (assuming those can be found first). So much of what Yahoo does is
maintaining a flat-lined late 1990s group of products.

~~~
product50
Good advice. So according to you nothing can be changed at Yahoo! no matter
who comes in. Apple was in a similar situation not long ago and I am sure
there were people like you commenting similarly. I am not saying Marissa is
similar to Steve Jobs but at least she has the credibility and qualification
to make things work. Why comment when you have nothing to add?

~~~
adventureful
Apple is a once in a century example, good luck with that.

And besides, I didn't suggest nothing can be changed at Yahoo. I didn't say
that at all.

I said it should be blown apart, and the stagnant 1990s products should go.
Mayer should put her talents to work on a smaller core where growth can be
achieved with new products.

Yahoo Finance? Yahoo Sports? Search? Yahoo Mail? 1998 era portals? There's no
growth there. She might be able to revitalize energy into Flickr and adjust it
to a smart phone world, that'd be one existing major product worth giving some
attention to (for example).

Unless Mayer has something equivalent to the game changing PageRank approach
to search, there's absolutely nothing she can do to improve Yahoo's search
product. So what can she do with the existing product core exactly? Not much,
stagnation is inherent to most of the product segments in question.

The real simple angle is: ok, what's the gorilla / whirlwind product that's
going to revitalize Yahoo? Search? Not a chance. The content niche products
like sports or finance? Nope. Web mail? Comeon. Classifieds & jobs? Nope,
small potatoes. So what is it? To really grow a $20 billion company, you need
to find billions in new profit. Mayer will only find that with new products.
Unless you think she can take 1/4 of the search market back from Google or
take a huge chunk of the rest of the web email market.

Yahoo needs a blue ocean change.

All the stagnant parts should be sold off for a huge amount of cash. And she
should more or less start over and attack something new where Yahoo can own
its segment and build a gorilla product with huge growth potential (instead of
being 2nd or 3rd (etc) place in everything).

~~~
wonderyak
They've only stayed somewhat relevant the past decade due to partnerships and
these legacy sorts of services. I agree 100% with this. But what are they to
do? They aren't Amazon. Try and buy Netflix and battle it out with all the
other digital entertainment services?

~~~
adventureful
They're going to have to literally reinvent themselves. Not in the B.S. wishy-
washy way they've proclaimed numerous times. But in the balls out risky
reinvention where if you fail, the company potentially gets sold for peanuts.
They're not going to get anywhere playing it safe at this point.

The smart phone market is still relatively wide open for new, not-yet-thought-
of services. Yahoo could throw their focus strongly that direction and try to
matter there, betting on the future.

Buying Netflix wouldn't be a terrible idea, they're cheap these days
relatively speaking. They could bring a lot of cash to bear behind Netflix,
which could be put to use beefing up their streaming selection.

There are a few potential acquisitions they could do to get pointed in the
right direction in terms of products relevant to the future. Yelp and
Foursquare for example. They need to be able to properly handle services they
acquire however, and perhaps Mayer can do a better job of that than their
previous leadership. They'd need to do something more like what Google did
with YouTube.

Short of making a dramatic change, it's merely a game of milking old assets
for cash and slowly fading away.

~~~
cpeterso
In a day when Instagram can be acquired for $1B, how much would Yahoo have to
pay for Netflix? NFLX market cap is about $4.6B with $3B in assets.

~~~
wonderyak
Well that would certainly cover the 'risk everything to turn it around' idea
posited above. I don't think anyone thinks FB didn't overpay for Instagram, it
seemed like a desperate move, but then again they were flush with cash and it
might be a great value compared to building their own.

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vtry
I guess no compete not enforceable in California!

