All Things Digital

Last week, BoomTown posted a detailed piece on Yahoo’s plans for a massive rebranding and marketing push, which included the hiring of outside consultant Penny Baldwin, who was a former top exec at Young & Rubicam.

Yesterday, Baldwin became an official Yahoo exec, as SVP of global integrated marketing and brand management.

She has been described by many sources as much more colorful and bold in her style, advocating more aggressive ideas about reinvigorating the Yahoo brand.

“Well, Penny is definitely not Yahoo,” said one Yahoo source, joking about the company’s quainter, yodel-focused and purple-toned image. “Which is probably a good thing.”

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Where is Microsoft spending its $100 million in marketing for its new Bing search service?

Here’s a photo that was forwarded to me showing an advertisement on top of a taxi in Manhattan of a goodbye message from Bing, as well as NBC, to the late pop legend, Michael Jackson.

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In what many sources at the company said is a major push, Yahoo is working on a massive plan to overhaul its brand in order to repair a damaged public image and focus consumers on what defines Yahoo.

The effort is being spearheaded by newly installed Chief Marketing Officer Elisa Steele, who has hired well-known brand consulting firm Landor Associates, as well as an outside consultant named Penny Baldwin, who was a former top exec at brand and ad giant Young & Rubicam.

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There is no doubt that Microsoft is pulling out the stops with its launch of its renovated search service, now called Bing, with $100 million in marketing dollars.

But, besides lifting the software giant’s share of the search market in early surveys, has it also given Microsoft’s stock an added boost?

Yes, indeed, but only just over the last 30 days.

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Now what?

The party-all-night social-networking site that has been MySpace so far got a massive morning-after shock yesterday when 30 percent of its workforce was laid off.

And today, MySpace, which is still 1,000-strong, has to face the cold, harsh light of day in the aftermath of the restructuring and get busy quickly figuring out a way to reinvigorate a brand that has suffered after a stunning rocket of a start many years ago.

So, based on many sources I have spoken to over the last week, here’s a rundown of the next steps MySpace will likely be taking and who’ll be making them.

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Well, what else is Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz going to do, but talk smack?

Not at BoomTown–that was so two weeks ago!

About potential partner Microsoft, of course!

And, especially about its new Bing search engine.

And, most especially of all, since new stats from comScore yesterday showed that the new look and marketing push for Bing are showing promising initial signs.

Rut-roh!

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Allen Olivo, SVP of global brand marketing at Yahoo, is leaving the company, according to sources.

The departure is the latest at Yahoo, as major executive changes continue. It was announced today internally, which Yahoo confirmed to BoomTown.

Olivo was responsible for all aspects of its advertising and brand marketing strategy worldwide for Yahoo, which is about to undergo a major new push under CEO Carol Bartz.

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Former top Yahoo advertising exec David Karnstedt, who has been parked at a Silicon Valley venture firm since he left the company, has been named president and CEO of Efficient Frontier.

Interestingly, another former Yahoo exec, Ellen Siminoff, has also been CEO at the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based search engine marketing firm. She is now chairman.

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Who can resist an all-pork post yesterday in the New York Times about a recipe that has taken the Internet by, well, greasy storm?

The piece, by Damon Darlin, chronicles what started out as an Internet marketing scheme for a site called BBQAddicts.com, but that has turned into one of the more popular dishes online of late.

The dish? “Bacon Explosion.”

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One of Yahoo’s top marketing execs, Eric Hadley, who came to the company with a lot of acclaim in November, is set to leave for a new job in Microsoft’s MSN online service, several sources said.

Hadley had previously worked at Microsoft, although he had come to Yahoo from the CMO job at Heavy.com. At Yahoo, he was hired as its VP of U.S. field marketing.

It’s yet another sign of renewed executive unrest at Yahoo. Yesterday, BoomTown reported that Zimbra founder Satish Dharmaraj was leaving Yahoo, which was later confirmed by the company.

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We’re posting all the interviews from the sixth D: All Things Digital conference that took place in late May.

Here’s an interview that Walt Mossberg did with Michael Dell, the founder of the once-high-flying computer company who has returned as its CEO. Dell was forced to resume the role in 2007 after changing market conditions caused the company to falter and competition from Apple, Hewlett-Packard and Sony increased.

This is part three of three parts.

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An unusual Israeli-Palestinian joint venture start-up, which makes a cloud-based Web operating system letting users access their desktops from any computer with an Internet connection, is alleging a trademark violation by Microsoft in its new $300 million advertising campaign.

G.ho.st, which stands for “Global Hosted Operating System,” claims it has a pending trademark registration for the tagline “no walls.”

Microsoft disputes G.ho.st’s contention.

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Here are videos of three of the new “I’m a PC” ads, from Microsoft’s next phase of its Vista-doesn’t-bite advertising campaign.

You can decide if you like them or not. But BoomTown is declaring them a vast improvement on the quirky initial commercials that featured Microsoft Founder Bill Gates and comedian Jerry Seinfeld.

The software giant seems to be returning from its short visit in hipville to a more normal marketing message, with an it’s-a-small-world-after-all panoply of people declaring that they are all PCs.

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While the very quirky ads rolled out by Microsoft to tout itself, starring Bill Gates and comedian Jerry Seinfeld, got a ton of hype, it turns out there will be no more than than three already released.

It seems the churros have gone cold.

According to a Microsoft spokesman, the ads were apparently just a warmup for more to come, as early as tomorrow, and though the new ones will not use Seinfeld in any significant way, they might still feature Gates.

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First off, as Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski pointed out to me today, you have to give Yahoo props for using Gogol Bordello as the soundtrack and–more to the point–actually knowing about Gogol Bordello in the first place.

“Since when does [Yahoo CEO Jerry] Yang listen to gypsy punk?” asked Paczkowski in an email to me today.

Since Bill Gates started eating churros with Jerry Seinfeld and adjusting his skivvies hands-free, that’s when!

Oh dear, Yahoo has succumbed to the hipster, ironic thing–an unfortunate marketing virus that has hit Microsoft of late, too–in an under-the-covers “Start Wearing Purple” online marketing campaign.

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