Employees of Mozilla also protested his appointment as CEO - not just the board.
The skill set to invent Java Script simply does not automatically translate into a CEO's skill set.
The inventor of the Apple computer was never a CEO -
The CEO (Jobs) of Apple never invented anything.
A primary role of the CEO is to establish a company's culture and be the public face of an organization. Anytime a CEO allows his private life to interfere with the image of the company, that is a major failure.
There is NO expectation of privacy for a CEO. There isn't even privacy for coders or any others in an organization - a condition of hire for virtually any job now is a coder, IT, - anyone - must provide the passwords to their Facebook, twitter, Instagram, linkedin accts, etc.
All Eich had to do is say he's had a change of heart, etc. Meg Whitman did this to become CEO of HP after running a race for governor of CA and taking a strong position against gay marriage. (She lost badly!)
Eich doesn't even have the poise nor presence of a CEO - Mozilla is lucky he resigned so early !!!