Marissa Mayer is a woman I would tend to hold up to a light. She’s incredibly strong, intelligent and dedicated. Nothing to do with her being a woman, an argument brought up by The Kernel.
It was announced that she is to take the reigns on the mess that is Yahoo!, and hopefully push the company into a new dawn and have it succeed where it failed before, primarily around the products it has that just don’t stack up against Google. It’s a tough job, but if one person can sort that place out, it’s Mayer. Journalists are certainly fawning over her appointment now.
There’s another interesting story here though. People are miffed as to why Larry Page (Google’s CEO) didn’t appoint Mayer a role on the board of Google. That certainly would have made sure that one of the first employees stayed an employee. It’s important especially given her credentials and her input into so many of Google’s products over the years. But I wonder if Page & Brin are trying to return Google to their start-up days and get away from the Eric Schmidt years of corporate overlording. Mayer wasn’t necessarily part of that anymore than she was part of the start-up years, but she was more “out there” when the company was being helmed by Schmidt. I could be wrong here, but it seems right that perhaps Mayer represents a bit of an off period for Brin and Page’s career. I still reckon she should be kept around. Although a story on businessinsider says Googlers will be happy with her new job.
Today, her appointment to Yahoo! serves one significant dose of interest above all else… she’s legitimised Yahoo! in one day, something no previous CEO or product has been capable of doing in years.
