back to article Yahoo! 'f**ked me over'! says! Carol! Bartz!

Breaking up is hard to do for recently fired Yahoo! boss Carol Bartz, who learned she had been sacked via a telephone call from the company's chairman Roy Bostock. It could have been worse: instead of being paid $10m to leave quietly after failing to fix Yahoo!'s ailing business, the firm could easily have dumped Bartz via a …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Ah, Carol at it again

    She really needs to match words with deeds. She had nearly three years to turn it around, and she failed. I'd say that was a year too long...and given she's very overpaid, I'm not sympathetic. That being said, if the board can't face her to fire her, precious little chance of them facing the company issues, either

  2. Version 1.0 Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Wot, me worry?

    She'll be off to some other tech CEO post in a few days, why they pay these idiots such obscene amounts of money for these jobs is beyond me. I get the feeling that most of these CEO types pick strategies using a Ouija board ...

    Or maybe not, come to thing of it a Ouija board ought to work better than this.

    1. Voland's right hand Silver badge
      Devil

      Not so sure

      Yahoo would have been _WAY_ _WORSE_ off it continued to try to fight battles in search and social which were beyond salvation.

      The statement by the board is also frankly outright beyond idiotic. Seek growth in search and social? In 2005-2007 maybe. Now? FFS... that is asking to become roadkill on the information superhighway. WTF are they smoking?

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    For $10,000,000

    I would have fired myself.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      ....and kept quiet about it too :)

    2. Sam Liddicott
      Meh

      for $10M?

      For $10M I'd have fired the whole board if they'd asked me.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Up

      I'll underbid you at $5m

      P

    4. auburnman
      Unhappy

      Agreed

      I most definitely wouldn't have spunked $10M up the wall with a hissy fit given I could have lived at a very reasonable comfort level without ever having to work again.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Some how, I don't think $10m meant much to Carol; she made enough out of stock when at Sun Microsystems and Autodesk...

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @AC

      >>"For $10,000,000, I would have fired myself."

      For $10,000,000, * I* would have fucked myself.

  4. PhilipN Silver badge

    Not necessarily

    Using bad language and critical epithets is not necessarily disparaging in the context of defending her own reputation.

    A no-disparaging clause designed to protect the company's blushes does not necessarily protect the members of the board most perhaps all of whom are non-executive.

    BUT she forgot Rule No. 1 - keep your trap shut until you collect the $10M - then begin to serialise your memoirs.

    What a doofus!

    1. Disco-Legend-Zeke
      Pint

      "But I Meant DOOFUS...

      ..in a good way."

  5. jake Silver badge

    Those of us who knew her at DEC and Sun ...

    ... suggested she not leave Autodesk for an Internet-based company.

    Carol was never very strong in the "listen to folks in the trenches" department.

  6. Herby

    Hey! Yahoo!!

    I won't disparage you, give me the $10M (I mean like you were committed to giving it out so why waste it??).

    I should be so lucky (*SIGH*).

    1. Uncle Siggy
      Trollface

      Herby, don't be a doofus.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Yahoo! Boring! Irrelevant!

    Which is the problem I suppose.

  8. Cyberelic

    I have been tempted to try a Yahoo search a couple of times recently (within the last year anyway!). Prolly because there are various promotions which can get you nectar points or some such.

    On both occasions I have been shocked at the limited scope of the results - eg most recently, timber yards in S.E. London the nearest recommended was somewhere in N. Finchley!!!

    I think Yahoo are seriously crap, and deserve to sink and die.

    P.

    1. jake Silver badge

      @Cyberelic

      You go online instead of picking up your telephone directory for stuff like finding local timber yards? The mind absolutely boggles ...

      1. Gary Bickford

        telephone directory? what's that?

        For that matter, what's a telephone? Is that doohickey where all the addresses are numbers, and every time you move you have to get a new number? And you can't converse unless the other person is also connected at the same time? I've heard of those. I didn't know they still made them!

        :D

        Seriously, I don't have a home phone, haven't seen a phone book in years. I only actually talk on my cell about every 3rd day, for a few minutes. But I'm sitting on my boat, typing on a laptop connected via Verizon Broadband and a Wifi router.

        1. jake Silver badge

          Oh, I get it AC 10:12, and @Gary Bickford

          AC: TehIntraWebTubes[tm] are a group of tools I know well, having been using them since before there was TCP/IP ... but like most tools, I also know when NOT to use them. This is one such example.

          Gary: The "Cyberelic" character was looking for a lumber yard location. I just now, this instant, reached over my right shoulder and grabbed a copy of "TheYellowPages" from the location a current copy has lived since I first built this office. Less than five seconds later, I had the street addresses of all the lumber yards in the county, and a couple of the larger companies in neighboring counties.

          No telephone required. No Internet connection required, either. And faster information retrieval than either can ever hope to come close to, at least in this kind of example.

          Hint, kiddies: Learn to use ALL the tools at your disposal. It's what humans (are supposed to) do.

          1. Dave Fox
            Go

            @Jake

            I just used YELL.COM to get the same information, and I *bet* it look less time than it did for you to look it up in the physical yellow pages!

            I see absolutely no need these days for a physical copy of the yellow pages any more, but that is my personal preference. I couldn't even tell if I still have a copy kicking about somewhere, but I can access the same information online in seconds.

          2. Burch
            FAIL

            The Yellow Pages

            I chuck them out unopened. In fact I object to them sending me one. You live in the past if you must.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        @jake

        We don't quite get this internet thing yet, do we.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    I don't get it ...

    So, you completely fail at doing your job right & get offered a $10m severance package?

    ... and then you shoot yourself in the foot and leave with fuck all?

    I think the evidence here shows who the real doofus is.

    How do these people get into such ridiculously highly paid roles and effectively, fuck up?

    Guess it's all down to how much you can shmooze with the right people.

    I need to go back to college to learn how to do this.

    1. John Gaunt

      Misinterpreted Value of $10 Million

      If Wikipedia is correct, then she was compensated $47.2 million in 2009. What is another $10 million when you are already quite rich?

      The miniscule Googling that I have done indicates that she is a forceful person who speaks her mind. This incident is more proof of that.

  10. Lloyd
    Pint

    Am I the only person that smiled at this?

    $10,000,000 pay off and because she has a hissy fit she loses it all, who says the FSM has no sense of humour?

  11. WireBug
    Childcatcher

    YaWho?

    They haven't died yet? Someone put a bullet in the head of yahoo, it is a dying and suffering animal...lets put it out of its misery

  12. HP Cynic

    Optional

    Yahoo! has been a dead horse for a long time, her flogging may have actually kept it moving along for a few more years but it was never going to get back up again....damn I'm boring myself with this metaphor.

    I'm glad to see though that for once an obscene payout (for failure after all) was denied.

    But yeah, she's probably already very rich, will dive right into another overpaid job and probably fund a long-winded legal challenge way to extract some or all of that 10m anyway.

  13. Mark McC
    FAIL

    No surprise she lost the $10m

    After three years at Yahoo! her instinctive training to throw away money kicked in.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    How long before she turns up as HP's new CEO?

  15. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge

    Mary! Celeste!

    And what is YAHOO Creative Director now?

  16. zen1
    Coat

    What if...

    Her and Ballmer created an offspring? This causes me to wonder if the child would first throw its dirty diaper at someone, before launching into an obscenity laced tirade?

    Oh the humor... the humor...

  17. Ilgaz

    Nope you fscked it up

    Who was responsible for Bing engine deal and what the hell was wrong with Yahoo search while Google is being wasted by SEO spam everyday?

    You. For years, I didn't give up Yahoo search and enjoyed the clean results. One day, they said "powered by bing", less results. Another day, Bing started to steal from Google... Even worse spam.

  18. nyelvmark
    Coat

    10 million bucks down the drain for a few poorly-chosen words. If only El Reg's hacks were subject to the same penalty...

  19. Smoking Man
    Facepalm

    DEC, Sun?

    > How long before she turns up as HP's new CEO?

    Didn't know so far that she "managed" $SOMETHING at DEC and Sun as well.

    Heaven help, that really might lead her to the CEO job at HP!

    "Hello Carol, we're so excited to have you with us. Might we stuff your pockets with <insert insane amount of $m > first?"

  20. DanceMan
    Megaphone

    Waited! All! Week! For! This!

    Appears that all she could do as CEO was cut workers, but had no vision beyond that.

  21. Tom Stephenson

    She won't be happy till she runs for Gov of CA.

    :-)

    1. Ilgaz

      Won't Canadians ask about Yahoo?

      Seriously, we all call them names etc. but Yahoo is still popular, some parts have amazing success (mail, my yahoo, flickr).

      Last time they announced (they can't lie, public corp.), they had 250 million active Yahoo mail users alone.

      Their userbase is also influential, adult, rich and oldschool internet users. I got a mail address which must be wondering around for 12 years so I have to check it at least weekly.

      So, won't people who actually cares to vote ask about Yahoo to her? Don't forget Yahoo news is also popular and people visiting there really matters to politicians.

      A publicly swearing lady with a very questionable performance running a web giant will run for PM? For Canada? Canadians hate that movie but, are we watching Canadian Bacon? :)

  22. cloudgazer

    willing to bet they pay up the $10mil

    Why? Because otherwise she gets to sue them for it and to attempt to prove, in court, that they are a bunch of doofuses - while the rest of the world looks on and laughs.

  23. unitron
    FAIL

    What did she expect?

    She had to know, after they let the Microsoft buyout go by, that she was going to work for a bunch of idiots.

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    10 Million?

    Step 1. Buy a safe

    Step 2. Buy PM's.

    Step 3. Fill safe with PM's.

    Step 4. Wait for everything in fiat or paper to pop.

    Step 5 Profit.

  25. Axl Pros

    Who's been Fu**ed?

    The ever lovely Carol managed to take the company from a tentative offer by MS of $47B, to a market cap of $16B. Let's not forget that the stock holders and employee with stock options might feel just a little angst. She of course has strong competition from Meg Whitlem (eBay) and Carley (HP) in value lost. Of course women are not usual tryst distructive - men hold the championship.

    But let's be honest, men don't usually complain when the axe rightfully falls.

    1. cloudgazer
      FAIL

      Bzzt - Wrong

      Sorry, it was Jerry Yang who took Yahoo from $47BN in Feb 08 down to $17BN in December 08. Bartz arrived Jan 09, when Bartz left it was worth somewhat over $18BN. Not good performance of course, but not the catastrophe that Jerry and the board presided over.

  26. mraak

    Completely failed?

    Well maybe not.The way things were going at Yahoo!, they might have ended up as MySpace or similar crap if it wasn't for her.

  27. Ascylto
    Big Brother

    23456!

    She can afford it!

    Didn't she collect over 40 million from her last but one employer?

    She doesn't know when to stop!

    The tears are running down ... my back!

  28. Inventor of the Marmite Laser Silver badge

    Nice to see malware punters getting stiffed.

    As someone who has removed God knows how many instances of the fscking Yahoo fscking Toolbar I think I can safely say it serves you bloody right.

    1. Burch
      Mushroom

      Too right

      Their scummy business practices should see them extinct before too long.

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