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Sunday, September 13, 2009

Exclusive: Yahoo Set to Unveil Massive New Marketing Campaign at Advertising Week, Declaring Size Does Matter

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Yahoo is set to unveil a major marketing campaign to reset advertiser and consumer perception of the long-troubled company during Advertising Week in New York, which starts a week from tomorrow.

According to numerous sources BoomTown has spoken to about the campaign, Yahoo is–at least with advertisers–going to focus on stressing the size and scale of the Internet giant. With consumers, the Internet giant will push the idea of being a key hub on the Web.

The details of the plan will be made public Tuesday, Sept. 22, at a press conference with senior Yahoo execs, including CEO Carol Bartz.

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Friday, September 11, 2009

Yahoo’s Bartz (No. 8), Facebook’s Sandberg (No. 22), Google’s Mayer (No. 44) and More Techies Make Fortune’s 50 Most Powerful Women List

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Time Inc.’s Fortune magazine–which never met a list it did not like to make–had a solid group of women tech types on its “50 Most Powerful Women 2009” roster, the annual survey that it posted yesterday.

Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz made the Top Ten this year, clocking in at No. 8, along with a lot of other tech-savvy women in Silicon Valley and elsewhere.

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Friday, March 13, 2009

For Getting the Skinny on Apple Stock Hijinks Alone, BoomTown Hearts Jon Stewart

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While the fireworks were great, the most important thing that “The Daily Show” host Jon Stewart elicited out of CNBC’s most famous stock jester, Jim Cramer, was the admission of using the malleable press to float fictional rumors about companies in order to make money on the negative news.

While Cramer at first tried to deny he did it, Stewart had the videotape of the “Mad Money” host talking about the practice, specifically in regards to Apple.

Kind of puts all those Steve-Jobs-Is-Dead-Right-Now rumors from a few months ago into a new light?

While we all know Jobs has been quite ill, grave-dancing rumors written without any serious reporting have also been a troublesome issue, because it was clear greedy short-sellers played a large part in stoking the fear about his immediate demise back then.

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Tuesday, January 6, 2009

To Err Is Human, to Live Divine: How Exactly No One Got It Right About Steve Jobs’s Health

You knew it was coming, of course.

Since the blogosphere couldn’t actually kill him off–deeply lazy and incredibly wrong in insinuating that Apple CEO Steve Jobs was dying imminently–it turned around yesterday and declared him a liar for not saying he had a “hormonal imbalance” sooner.

Of course, Apple has also played along in this bizarre game, along with its defenders, who have all tried to pretend nothing is wrong with a man who clearly looks like he has had the stuffing knocked out of him because of his long-running health issues.

Since the facts of the matter seem dead on arrival, get Marcus Welby, M.D., stat!

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Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Memo to All Crepe-Hangers: It Still Ain’t Nobody’s Business If Jobs Is or Isn’t

Now, it’s getting flat-out macabre.

That would be the continuing swirl of attention the health of Apple icon Steve Jobs has been getting.

Rumors of his impending demise have been popping up periodically since the too-thin crisis of the Worldwide Developers Conference in June and look like they won’t stop until it actually comes true.

My grandmother used to have a perfect rejoinder for this kind of funeral-chasing behavior, which was prevalent among her gang of Italian sisters, who–whenever anyone caught a cold–predicted the worst outcome: “Don’t be a crepe-hanger.”

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Thursday, November 13, 2008

Where in the World Is Yahoo’s Board?

With a $10 stock price, the turning down of Microsoft’s $31 a share offer, a collapsed search ad deal with Google, fleeing execs and bad news aplenty, it’s easy to blame Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang and call for his ouster.

After all, the buck does stop with him.

Or does it? Because, to my mind, if there is anyone to cast stones at in the ongoing crisis at Yahoo, BoomTown would have to toss a large boulder in the direction of the company’s incredibly shrinking board.

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Thursday, September 18, 2008

Live From New York: ATD Hires Peter Kafka to Pen a New Media and Advertising Blog

Although we did not raid the offices of Silicon Alley Insider and “steal” Peter Kafka, as the fanciful SAI kingpin Henry Blodget alleges–had it been a raid, BoomTown would have properly hog-tied Blodget so he could not make such spurious allegations!–it is true that SAI’s current managing editor (pictured here) will be coming to work for us at AllThingD.com soon.

He will write a daily still-unnamed new media blog from New York City, starting at the end of October.

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Wednesday, July 9, 2008

The iPhone Review? The Really Big News Is Walt’s Fancy Suit!

While Walt Mossberg’s review of Apple’s latest version of the 3G iPhone is getting all the buzz after it appeared last night, BoomTown is more riveted to the ad next to it that pictures our longtime partner in a very natty suit and tie.

Oh, I have seen a suit on the typically more casually dressed Walt before–at my wedding and when Walt got a big award from Columbia. But we really like the photo of him in what looks like a James Bondish Brioni in the ad for his debut this week on the Fox Business News.

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Wednesday, May 21, 2008

MicroHoo: Slim Pickens

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Is it just me or did anyone else find the T. Boone Pickens (pictured here) quote about why he bought 10 million shares in Yahoo a little scary and a lot appalling?

“The only thing I know about Yahoo is what [CNBC Host] David [Faber] just told me, and that Carl Icahn is a big shareholder,” said the folksy chairman of BP Capital yesterday.

Yes, Icahn, the well-known Internet expert!

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Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Dum…dum…dum…dum… dum…dum… AAAGH!

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If Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang thought Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was scary, meet persnickety investor Carl Icahn.

According to CNBC, which was doubtlessly leaked the threat by the clever billionaire to test the waters, he has bought as much as 50 million shares in the troubled Internet company as part of a potential proxy fight.

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Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Video of PRSA What’s Hot and What’s Not in Tech Event

If you are a glutton for punishment, here is the entire video from the Public Relations Society of America’s Silicon Valley chapter’s annual “Media Influencer” dinner, held at the Computer History Museum last week.

BoomTown was one of the tech writers on the panel, which was talking about what the big trends in tech in 2007 [...]

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Thursday, November 29, 2007

Kara Visits the Public Relations Society of America–Silicon Valley Chapter–Dinner

Last night, the Public Relations Society of America’s Silicon Valley chapter held its annual “Media Influencer” dinner at the Computer History Museum, which featured a spate of tech journalists pitching a large room full of PR people about what’s hot in the sector.
Turning the tables this year–and apparently getting “honored” by the group–were: Victoria Barret [...]

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Thursday, October 18, 2007

Dinner and Chatting with Rupe (aka BoomTown’s New Boss)

Did I wangle a seat right next to soon-to-be Dow Jones owner Rupert Murdoch last night at the Web 2.0 Summit dinner?
Of course I did, continuing in the shameless BoomTown tradition of trying to get gratis meals with moguls (like our ongoing efforts to raise money for DonorsChoose.org and get a free lunch with Yahoo [...]

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About Kara

Kara Swisher started covering digital issues for The Wall Street Journal's San Francisco bureau in 1997 and also wrote the BoomTown column about the sector. With Walt Mossberg, she co-produces and co-hosts D: All Things Digital, a major high-tech and media conference. Read more »

Ethics Statement

Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.

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