No one knows yet what Thompson–formerly the president of PayPal–will do at the helm of Yahoo. But reading through the announcement of Thompson’s hiring, it’s clear that Yahoo’s days as an Internet innovator are long gone, never to return.
“Delivering the Value Our Shareholders Expect”
Yahoo’s press release is filled with plenty of business jargon. It speaks of how Thompson can “grow the core business and deliver increased value for our shareholders,” and Thompson himself says he wants to “get a clearer understanding of the needs of our advertisers and publishers.”
But if you were hoping for a rousing statement on rejuvenating Yahoo as a tech company, or even a clear definition of the kind of company Yahoo wants to become under Thompson, you won’t find it in the company’s announcement.
More importantly, the press release makes no mention of building great products for Yahoo users, or figuring out how to make the company exciting again. Instead, Thompson says his ultimate goal is “delivering the value our shareholders expect.”
While I understand that lining shareholders’ pockets is the goal of any publicly traded company, that goal should be a byproduct of building great products. From Thompson’s statements, all I see is a company that wants to extract more money from its large but bloated content portals.
“For the Company and its Shareholders”
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