As Yahoo continues to be in limbo, pressure is sure to mount heavily on its CEO and Co-Founder Jerry Yang, and it is not a stretch to imagine he will not remain in the top job at the troubled company for the long term.

So who would be good to replace him?

I have six candidates I like, so here’s my short list (and remember, the last time I made one for the job of the No. 2 leader for Facebook, its current COO Sheryl Sandberg was high on my list).

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Imagine this:

Google starts buying up a series of promising and innovative Web 2.0 companies that Microsoft is either partnered with or clearly is or should be interested in.

It starts with Digg, moves onto, say, Spot Runner and others (Meebo, FriendFeed, iLike and even Slide?), focused especially in the online ad, messaging, online apps and mobile spaces.

And, just to stir up the pot, why not take a gander at some bigger Internet fish?

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BoomTown hates to miss any possible opportunity to reference a Charlton Heston movie and, thus, was struck by a report by a Wall Street analyst that Google and Amazon will be the sole survivors of the most recent digital age.

Sanford C. Bernstein analyst Jeffrey Lindsay said as much in a 310-page report, “U.S. Internet: The End of the Beginning” he penned, noting that only the search giant and the e-commerce pioneer had legs.

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Several major investors in Yahoo–who have been, how shall BoomTown put this delicately, freaked out by the sudden departure of Microsoft from the deal two weeks ago–have blamed the passive-aggressive style of Yahoo, and especially Yahoo CEO and Co-Founder Jerry Yang, on the collapse of those talks as a big problem.

But this time, according to several investors, Yahoo is making sure things go a little better, especially given the increasing anger on the part of its shareholders and the recent proxy attack from billionaire investor Carl Icahn.

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Be careful what you wish for, Jerry Yang.

Because after talking to a dozen Yahoo execs over the weekend after the Microsoft takeover deal cratered, most of whom are vice presidents or above, I have to say that your stock drop isn’t the worst thing you will have to deal with this morning when you pull up at work.

The worst? That’ll be the very hairy eyeball you will be getting from a lot more of your employees, who are scared silly and a lot peeved by the limb many feel you have dragged them and their stock options out onto.

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Yes, the board of Yahoo is meeting today to try to devise new and more dastardly ways of wringing more money out of Microsoft.

For viewers just tuning in, so far this week on “As the Tiny-Incestuous-Petty-Juvenile-Digital World Turns,” Yahoo has been plenty busy:

An AOL mashup deal!

A Google search-ad partnership!

Even–cue the trumpets!!!–the late entrance of that man-about-Silicon-Valley from Web 1.0, Frank Quattrone, working for Google, which is helping Yahoo on AOL (and, fun, snake-eating-itself fact: as a banker, Quattrone worked for Yahoo when it was contemplating buying eBay).

This is so deliciously sweet, in terms of geek soap opera, that I fear I may get a major cavity soon.

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So, as readers of this blog know by now, I can get a little obsessed with certain digital companies or topics, sort of like a geek version of “Kolchak: The Night Stalker.”

Except, the werewolves BoomTown has been trying futilely to kill come in the form of juvenile widgets!

Over the last year, of course, I have been majoring in the foibles of Facebook and the tribulations of Yahoo, with a minor in studies of Internet video and online content creation in Hollywood.

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Since BoomTown did an obsessive countdown after Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang last year unwisely promised a 100-day, top-to-bottom look at the company, with “no sacred cows” spared (as it turned out, they all were), I decided that–after the month-mark had passed since Microsoft made its unsolicited bid for Yahoo–it was time for a count-up!

Thus, Day 32!

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If Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is serious about finding a true No. 2 to replace outgoing exec Owen Van Natta and more, then BoomTown has certainly at least two cents to add.
So here is our list of ideas, which include a number of women execs, since a list that Facebook has made apparently includes a [...]

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Of course, finally.

Sure, there might be a giant scramble among media and tech giants over the next few weeks to grab Yahoo, now that Microsoft has finally pulled the trigger on its longtime desire to buy the troubled Internet company.

But, as BoomTown and everyone else has written, another weak quarter, a continued muddled outlook, perpetually confused management goals and the dipping of Yahoo stock below $20 a share has finally added up to the tipping point that Microsoft had long been waiting for.

To say this could have been prevented is moot now–Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang and his execs have managed the company right into the arms of the software giant.

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Oh dear.
Even more waiting for Yahoo to turn itself around? Until 2009? Really? Another 100 days, and another, and another and then more than half of another?
This is starting to feel very, very familiar.
Too familiar.
Well, it did take seven months to replace Farzad Nazem as CTO at a–um, well–technology-dependent company, so perhaps the glacial pace [...]

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Look, I love a good takeover rumor as much as the next gossipy reporter.
But all the incessant rumblings of Microsoft sniffing around to buy Yahoo or Yahoo merging with eBay are getting a tad ridiculous.
So, Deal or No Deal? Um, no deal, Howie! Really, no deal at all.
What it feels like to me [...]

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Here’s some more video from the halls of Web 2.0 Summit, which is taking place this week in San Francisco.
Look to John Paczkowski of Digital Daily for liveblogging from the conference yesterday, which included appearances by Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer and eBay’s Meg Whitman.
Today is the final day, with digital bigshots onstage like: AT&T’s Randall Stephenson, [...]

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Some digital-iscious videos to peruse:
Some are worried about eBay’s recent financial results and some are not:

It’s good to be pregnant at Google (but maybe not so good to be old), including–no joke–”Expectant Mother Parking” spots:

Seagate CEO Bill Watkins, who is a firecracker, talks about the drive-maker’s sharp earnings:

Tesla Motors’ Martin Eberhard (they love him in [...]

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Here’s some video from the halls of Web 2.0 Summit, which is taking place this week in San Francisco.
As you will see, it is quite the Bubblefest, with all sorts of geeky bonhomie and aspiring hopefulness of also landing a $15 billion valuation, as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg noted he was about to do onstage [...]

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