Yesterday, BoomTown wrote about the status of the regulatory approval for the Microsoft-Yahoo search and online advertising pact.

While none of the key constituencies wanted to comment or make predictions about the outcome of the government scrutiny, most seem to agree that the MicroHoo partnership is more likely to be approved than not.

One of the few vocal critics of the deal, though, is Jeffrey Chester, the executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy, a public interest group.

CDD, along with several other consumer groups, recently sent a letter to the Justice Department’s antitrust head, Christine Varney, expressing concern about the control and collection of consumer data in the deal.

CDD also has been querying Microsoft (MSFT) and Yahoo (YHOO) directly about the data collection and privacy implications of the deal, which is something the government should be doing.

So, to further get a glimpse into MicroHoo’s arguments, here is a set of important questions Chester asked then that were answered in a memo by the pair:

What specific data collection, interactive ad technologies and targeting applications will be used for search under the 10 year deal?

Today, Yahoo! collects data about Yahoo! visitors to our search product and uses that information to deliver products and to customize advertising and content, among other purposes described in its Privacy Policy. Microsoft and Yahoo! have each adopted industry-leading privacy practices with respect to search. For instance, under Yahoo!’s global data retention policy, Yahoo! anonymizes user log data within 90 days with limited exceptions for fraud, security and legal obligations. For search specifically, Yahoo! will convey certain data to Microsoft to fulfill a user’s search request. This includes the query and the IP address. Microsoft will anonymize this data sent to it by Yahoo! in accordance with Yahoo!’s announced data retention policies. Microsoft is only permitted to use search data that it obtains under the deal to operate and improve its search services and for no other purpose.

Will Yahoo’s behavioral targeting technologies for search still be used?

Yahoo! does not currently employ behavioral targeting in search. [Ed. note: Not completely true; see press release from Yahoo here on new targeting capabilities.]

Will any of Yahoo’s targeting apparatus be incorporated in any way with Microsoft Advertising, including with Bing?

No. This deal is limited to search, and as noted above, Yahoo! does not employ behavioral targeting in search.

Will search ads be sold by either Yahoo or Microsoft that provide for multimedia results, such as video?

Video advertising is still a small and growing area and as such, it’s impossible to predict what video ads in any form, including what a potential video search ad, could look like several years from now.

How may this deal affect the Yahoo! Newspaper Consortium?

The partnership Yahoo! has with the newspapers is broad and includes everything from content distribution, advertising cross sales, and technology platform development, to the display of Y! sponsored search listings on the newspapers’ own Web sites. Yahoo! Does not see the Microsoft deal as having an immediate impact on its newspaper consortium dealings. However, by combining its platform with Microsoft’s, Yahoo! and Microsoft will be in a position to offer the Newspaper Consortium and other web publishers more competitive bids for search syndication deals than either company can offer separately.

What ad research and development will be shared or done in common?

It is premature to speculate about the exact research that will be done, but the increased scale that will result from this search deal is expected to significantly enhance the ability to conduct meaningful research in a timely manner.

What rationale was used to embrace the 3 month data retention time? Why isn’t a shorter retention time adopted?

Yahoo! did an extensive analysis and review of all our data systems globally in 2008. Yahoo! arrived at 90 days retention as the right timeframe for most of its log file data that allows it to deliver the industry-leading products and services its users expect from them, but that also minimizes the duration of time Yahoo! holds data in identifiable form. It’s important to note that some of Yahoo!’s log file systems retain identifiable data for less than 90 days but none will hold data longer except for a limited number of specific systems dedicated to fraud and abuse and to meet legal obligations.

How do you envision Yahoo remaining viable when it no longer has a meaningful independent search service, given the need to have a coordinated search/display environment for digital marketing?

Future growth in online marketing will come from shifting spend from offline advertising to the online world. Offline advertising spend is disproportionately held by the largest advertisers and they control the vast majority of ad spend. Yahoo! has the leading position in branded advertising and Yahoo! also serves the needs for the growing market of performance advertising. So this deal with Microsoft enables Yahoo! to deliver a fully integrated solution that meets marketers’ needs at scale. Through this deal, Yahoo! retains a revenue stream in search without incurring the costs of developing a search platform or engine. Yahoo! will get paid an 88% TAC rate while eliminating significant expenses, enabling Yahoo! to invest more heavily in other areas of focus: amazing audience properties, web products, enhanced display advertising capabilities, and fantastic mobile experiences.

Last week, a cougar was reported to be roaming on the Redmond, Wash., campus of Microsoft, which led to all kinds of cutesy jokes about the new Snow Leopard operating system from Apple (AAPL).

No, BoomTown cannot make this stuff up!

Nor did I make up this original and very fine global alert that Microsoft Global Security sent last week, which assured employees of the software giant that “Microsoft Security will conduct frequent patrols of all wooded areas of the campus.”

That’s more than you can say about how the software giant handles hackers!

Here’s an image of the memo (click on it to see a large version):

Previously, TechFlash had the text of the second warning, which gives cougar-fighting tips.

They included:

“Stay calm. Talk to the cougar in a confident voice.”

“Do not run. Try to back away from the cougar slowly. Sudden movement or flight may trigger an instinctive attack. Do not turn your back on the cougar. Face the cougar and remain upright.”

And, most important of all: “Do all you can to enlarge your image. Don’t crouch down or try to hide. Pick up sticks or branches and wave them about.”

Which, if you think about it, is even better advice for Microsoft (MSFT) Bing execs–this means you, Yusuf!–in tangling with search archrival Google (GOOG).

BoomTown promised a Yahoo internal memo upon our return from vacation today and we will not let you down.

Thus, here’s a doozie Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Carol Bartz recently sent to her troops.

It’s actually from mid-August, although it took me this long to get my hands on it, as people at the company are justifiably a little memo-leaking shy after this missive that complains of the sugar-low mood of the staff.

One in a series of weekly Friday communications from her, some of which I have posted before, this one got a lot of attention internally, especially among the down-in-the-dumps engineering staff, who were less than pleased with the damn-the-torpedoes-stop-yer-whining tone of the memo.

Whatever the reaction, it is certainly a classic Bartz times 10–a definite back of the hand for those Yahoos who perhaps dwelled too much on whether or not they liked the recent search deal she struck with Microsoft (MSFT).

Here’s the basic gist of it: Fie on naysayers, stop bellyaching, Yahoo rocks and get back to work!

And here’s the memo–referencing the tough week, her knee surgery and the need to focus, people!!!–with the email address section omitted:

I’ve had one! All the work, all the explaining, all the opinions!

I wanted to crawl into a hole and eat chocolate (and of course my knee boo-boo made me feel even sorrier for myself). Making the search decision and driving this much change for us was hard, but it is done.

So I am out of the hole, ready to attack the future. We are Yahoo! 581 MILLION PEOPLE came to us last month. Our audience increased 1.9% month-over-month, faster than the overall Internet population (1.2%).

Our job is to keep growing that audience with a great homepage, great media properties, great communications products and a great search experience. Match that with a compelling advertiser program and voila! We are the largest media property on the Internet.

So get out of the sugar low–we have work to do. Stop staring at our navels, stop arguing with each other. Stop debate, debate, debate, and let’s focus on the competition.

Let’s focus on a great Yahoo! Our average user is just trying to get through the day…looking to find out what’s going on in the big world and their own world. They want their Internet site to be great, and to work. They don’t care about how or about deals. They care that we are a trusted dependable site.

That is our simple mission. Focus on it!!!

From vacation, that is–an activity that I highly recommend (and getting toasted at Burning Man this week does not count, although that is also apparently highly recommended in order to endure that digital dustfest).

In any case, we begin Yahoo memo-bombing in five minutes.

That is all.

Well, except for all that there is to check in on, such as the state of the regulatory approval process in the Microsoft (MSFT) and Yahoo (YHOO) deal, the upcoming Apple (AAPL) confab next week, figuring out if Twitter has either made some money or decided to sell out, ditto for Time Warner (TWX) online unit AOL and, of course, discerning whatever evil plot Google (GOOG) and Facebook are cooking up .

Also this week: BoomTown visits Activision Blizzard (ATVI) Guitar Hero HQ and Adobe (ADBE), considers the online document space, chats with some VCs in Silicon Valley, checks out some new start-ups and more.

Starting today and through next week, BoomTown is headed south down California’s lovely Highway 1 for as much of a vacation as I can possibly take.

Which is to say, just a week off from posting (if one does pop up, forgive me, but it was probably already baked).

In other words: iLike twins, Wenda, Owen, play nice! Yahoos, please hold onto your internal memos. And I hope Apple’s iTablet is not delivered from on high this week while I relax beachside (it won’t be).

This summer has been unusually news-laden for the digital sector–the Yahoo (YHOO) deal with Microsoft (MSFT); all the machinations at News Corp.’s (NWS) MySpace, Facebook and Time Warner (TWX) online unit AOL; various and sundry Google (GOOG) battles; some tasty Amazon (AMZN) follies; Palm (PALM) Pre-ambulations; and, of course, more Apple (AAPL) hijinks than you can count.

Oh yeah, and whatever Twitter fill-in-the-blank-you-like.

But I digress, and will now return to my annual scheduled programming–a blog-free week with some really interactive time with the kids and family in Santa Monica.

This week is a particularly good time to take time–a big birthday celebration for my Twitter-bashing mother and also a 10th wedding anniversary (an inexplicable event, except to say–given it is me we’re talking about–that I obviously married a saint).

For all that and more, see you in September. (Actually, August 31, but who’s counting?)

And, until then, here is a cool video of someone playing a 45 of that great song by the Happenings on an old turntable:

Yahoo is closer to naming a new international head, according to sources, the last big slot left in the top management structure of CEO Carol Bartz.

While BoomTown is endeavoring to get the name of this international man of mystery, several sources said the company has come close to settling on a London-based media exec, who will move to and operate out of its Sunnyvale, Calif., HQ in Silicon Valley.

But it is unclear if or when a final appointment will be made.

That exec could be a lot of people, since Yahoo’s headhunter for the job–Heidrick & Struggles–has pretty much talked to the gamut of international Web muckety-mucks since the search started six months ago.

The many chatted up include: Former Bebo head Joanna Shields (nope, she has a noncompete from AOL); former Joost CEO Mike Volpi (nope, he just landed as a VC at Index Ventures), Microsoft (MSFT) consumer and online man in Britain Ashley Highfield (hmm, would he move so quickly after jumping from Project Kangaroo and the BBC?) and Gavin Patterson, head of the BT Retail unit.

But Yahoo could also opt for a more traditional media exec, said some sources.

In a memo to Yahoo staff after her reorganization in February, Bartz said that “international growth is critical for Yahoo!, which has become too reliant on its U.S. business over the years.”

Still, that key job remains unfilled, in an arena Yahoo has dropped the ball in recently, even as more nimble competitors like Google (GOOG) and Facebook thrive.

In the Yahoo (YHOO) management chart posted below, Bartz has filled the CFO role with Tim Morse and the customer advocacy slot with Jeff Russakow.

Without an international head, the three regional heads worldwide–Rose Tsou (Asia), Rich Riley (Europe) and Keith Nilsson (Emerging Markets)–have continued to report to Bartz. The U.S. region–Yahoo’s most significant market–is headed by Hilary Schneider.

Here is the Yahoo top management org chart, released back in February (click on it to make it larger):

BoomTown just got an interesting memo that Yahoo CMO Elisa Steele sent out to her staff immediately in the wake of the deal for Microsoft to take over Yahoo’s search technology business two weeks ago.

I render it unto you, dear readers, since it shows just how intent the top managers of Yahoo (YHOO) are, especially internally, in reassuring those concerned that Yahoo had not just gutted itself and how it can remain as innovative as ever.

Also amusing–for reasons I cannot understand, since it is an internal memo–is the use of the code name for Yahoo, which is called Yale, after the famous university in New Haven, Conn.

(By the way, “Boola, Boola” is one of Yale’s old football fight songs, which you can hear here.)

By the way, Microsoft (MSFT) was known as Cambridge, Mass.-based MIT, as you can see below.

Also some fun facts, showing the give-it-the-old-college-try mentality of Yahoo dealmakers:

In past merger talks, Time Warner (TWX) online unit AOL’s moniker has been Amherst College in Amherst, Mass.

And, when Yahoo was considering the Yahoogle deal, the code name for Google (GOOG) was Georgetown, after the Washington, D.C.-based university. That must really rankle at the MIT-stuffed search giant, since–as a graduate of Georgetown–I can tell you, tech is not exactly its forte.

Here’s the Steele memo:

From: Elisa Steele
To: Marketing-all@yahoo-inc.com
Sent: Wed Jul 29 05:11:52 2009
Subject: Announcement today.

Marketing Yahoos,

Yale is already the place where millions go to see what is happening with the people and things that matter to them most, but our aspirations have always been bigger than that. Our vision is to be at the center of people’s online lives, and the deal we announced with MIT earlier today will enable us to focus even more of our efforts on realizing it.

At the same time, our role as marketers has never been more critical. We must focus our energies on engaging our users and our partners, and on making sure that our brand initiatives continue unabated.

Our consumer marketing teams will keep driving more users to our leading audience properties, mobile experiences and applications. Our b2b team will continue communicating to marketers that as the world’s largest media company, Yale offers the most compelling and unique advertising proposition in the industry. The Insights team will continue delivering industry-leading research that helps speed the flow of dollars online. The Global Communications team will be answering lots of important questions from the media and influencer community about this deal (in addition to building buzz around the other amazing stuff we’re doing). The brand team will not stray at all from its mission, as it’s as relevant as ever. And, our regional marketing teams remain in place, partnering with our business leaders to execute our global marketing strategy.

In a nutshell, this is our opportunity to further establish Yale mindshare and preference with all of our audiences through world-class marketing. Our work is more important today than ever before as we communicate our brand position globally.

We are making decisions that we believe set the company up for continued success—and enable us to take back our rightful place in the market.

It’s an exciting new day at Yale, and I couldn’t be more optimistic about our future.

Elisa Steele
Executive Vice President &
Chief Marketing Officer
Yahoo!

And below, I have posted a video of the Yale Glee Club performing all the university’s fight songs in a delightful medley, so Yahoos can start practicing now:

A few weeks ago, when I was having breakfast with legendary Silicon Valley entrepreneur Marc Andreessen about his new venture fund, he talked about what he thought was critical to being successful as an Internet company.

Ticking off names, from Apple (AAPL) CEO Steve Jobs to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Andreessen said he always favored technical entrepreneurs for one key reason: “You need someone who lives and breathes product.”

It’s a refrain I have heard a lot recently from a wide range of people in the sector, most especially when talking about two of the more challenging renovations of key Internet brands going on of late.

That would be: Yahoo and MySpace.

In recent days, the focus at both Yahoo (YHOO) and MySpace, a division of News Corp. (NWS), has been on cost cuts, management rejiggering and, of course, layoffs, as new leaders at each Web giant are trying mightily to push the reset button. (News Corp owns Dow Jones, which owns this Web site.)

No surprise, their efforts have gotten a lot of attention and have been the subject of a lot of coverage (here for Yahoo and here for MySpace).

But, as those clean-up efforts wrap up, both have to show a whole lot more than that if either is to truly succeed at their tasks–which is to make both services much more relevant and exciting in the fast-changing Web arena.

While Yahoo and MySpace remain huge Web properties–and Yahoo, in particular, is very profitable in comparison to most Internet outfits–the widespread perception across the digital sector for too long now is that they are both tired in some significant ways and in desperate need of innovation.

Their big tasks include an overhaul of product offerings and features, a refreshing of brand and, most importantly, a strategic rethink that will set them on a new course for the next several years.

This is not a new thing in the Internet space, which has seen once-popular companies fall by the wayside as their products have gotten dull and consumers weary.

AOL–the Time Warner (TWX) unit whose new CEO, Tim Armstrong, is trying to reinvigorate that iconic but deeply tarnished brand too–is the classic example of this problem. But there have been too many that either hobble along, get subsumed into a larger company or just wither and die.

Sudden death is not likely to be the case for either Yahoo or MySpace, but time is most definitely running out for the pair to show some true product pizzazz and a strategic road map.

At Yahoo, most of the glitter thus far has come from the personality and charms of CEO Carol Bartz (pictured here), who has been hard at work projecting an image of moxie and decisiveness in her efforts to get some momentum at the turmoil-plagued company.

Replacing former CEO and co-founder Jerry Yang, Bartz has largely been busy cutting staff, pruning products that she recently dubbed “space debris” and rounding out her executive staff.

She’s also been prepping a new branding campaign to accompany Yahoo’s overhauled front page, which is set for the fall.

But, as the famous Peggy Lee song (see video below) goes: “Is that all there is, is that all there is?/If that’s all there is my friends, then let’s keep dancing/Let’s break out the booze and have a ball/If that’s all there is.”

But breaking out the booze and having a ball is actually not such a bad idea. To my mind, instead of tweaking what is there and emphasizing what it has been, Yahoo now has the chance to just go for broke and boldly make some dramatic choices.

That is especially true if it forgoes a search and online advertising partnership with Microsoft (MSFT), since Yahoo is going to have to do more than just what it already does better.

Interestingly, it is Microsoft, with its well-reviewed new Bing search service, that seems the most aggressively innovative these days.

So, why not, for example, make a shocking move, say, into the premium online video space? Yahoo certainly could pick up some damaged goods, like Veoh and Joost, on the cheap.

But what about buying the early winner: Hulu?

While the three studios that are its joint owners (the fourth owner is Providence Equity Partners)–News Corp., Disney (DIS) and GE (GE) unit NBC Universal–don’t seem inclined to sell, many sources close to the company said they most certainly would for the right price and perhaps a stake in Yahoo too.

Yahoo has been one of Hulu’s many distribution partners, but that effort has been lackluster. As owner, it would surely point its vast traffic and tech resources at Hulu to good effect.

In this kind of scenario, Google (GOOG) and Comcast (CMCSA) are also contenders for Hulu, but it is only Yahoo that has the truly better record of being able to create, manage and distribute Web content.

Plus, you could call it: HuHoo or YaLu or, better still, HooLu.

There are lots of ideas along these lines for Yahoo, but the overarching idea is to dominate in areas its rivals do not.

For MySpace, which was the dominator until rival Facebook cleaned its clock and then some, it is both a crisis of identity, a broken consumer experience and technology that needs a major overhaul.

It is hard to say what MySpace is, except really noisy. While the music part of that is good, the idea of making it hip again seems well-nigh impossible.

But it could be useful as an entertainment hub where it is fun to be. News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch raised this concept recently, in fact, and it is a good one.

That’s because Facebook is aggressively un-fun, with a fascist design sensibility and a thick ethos of utility and enforced busy-ness. Whenever I use it, I always start to feel like I am 23 minutes late.

There really is no good overall and unified entertainment hub on the Web in a massive way–one that aggregates all kinds of interests. I would, for example, love a place where I could easily live in a “Gossip Girl” universe.

Best of all, such a direction moves MySpace well away from Facebook, where is needs to get pronto.

MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta (pictured here) said as much in a memo to employees yesterday:

“As I’ve said before, simplifying and unifying our site is fundamental to our success going forward. MySpace should feel like one platform–not 15 sites loosely stitched together. We consider our diverse content offering a strength but too many logos and disorganized verticals makes the site difficult to navigate and creates confusion about our brand identity. Our users don’t know if we’re a social portal, a music site, or an entertainment hub.”

In her own memo last week, Bartz also talked about the need for speed and definition of Yahoo:

“I’ve noticed that since the reorg, people seem like they’re waiting for something. I’m not sure if it’s a sugar-low or what, but we need to stop waiting and get moving. Good things do not come to those who wait, they come to those who make things happen.”

Actually, per Marc Andreessen, good things come to those who make things. Wonderful things, fun things, memorable things and, if you are Steve Jobs, just one more thing.

Let’s just hope in the case of Yahoo and MySpace, they don’t settle for just any thing.

Until they do that thing they do, here is a catchy video from the movie, “That Thing You Do”:

For all the noisy hubbub over should-we-or-shouldn’t-we-publish confidential documents hacked from password-protected accounts of Twitter employees, as well as a Twitter spouse, it is actually pretty simple.

Stolen equals stolen.

But, because this is a “hot” issue and it concerns an even hotter Web 2.0 company–Holy traffic-gooser, Batman!–the debate will surely go on and on, even as the stolen information inevitably leaks its way out.

Still, let’s not pretend what it is and is not.

It is most definitely not, for example, one of those great dramatic moments in journalism.

Thus, comparing the ruminations over whether to publish egregiously obtained information–however true–to the debate over a major event like the New York Times publishing the Pentagon Papers is pathetic.

It is, though, a tempest in a Silicon Valley teapot.

In point of fact, my colleague Peter Kafka, who works from New York, wrote me tonight:

“Was at a fancy schmooze tonight packed with digital media bigwigs: Viacom, NBC, News Corp, plus lots of start-up guys. TwitterGate was on *no one’s* lips. I talked to one guy who has a stake in the company and he pretty much shrugged about it–several people had no idea about it at all. Total non-news.”

It is not, however self-righteously (and pompously) put forth, much of a dilemma.

As the very clever John Gruber of Daring Fireball put it: “What you may ask, is the dilemma, since it is clear that any decent human being would simply refuse to have anything to do with something so lurid?”

Indeed, it is unequivocally wrong to publish documents you know or think were stolen or hacked, because it is aiding and abetting that theft.

In this regard, then, there should be no difference between “Web” journalism and the old-fashioned journalism–acting as if the former gets a “process journalism” (what a crock!) pass at standards and ethics that should be eternal and unwavering, no matter the medium.

And it is a little like pitting “gay” marriage against marriage, in order to create a false dichotomy, designed only to obfuscate the issues.

So, it also isn’t kosher to try to take focus of your own wrongdoing by pointing to other practices, which is almost always an obnoxious reach by the willfully immature.

While comparisons to leaked company documents have been made–and BoomTown knows from leaked corporate memos–this is a lazy-man’s argument, since it simply does not track.

The Twitter docs were stolen from personal accounts, an obvious pilfer, which immediately changes the equation completely.

While you certainly can have a lively debate about whether Yahoos should pass along some widely distributed memo that CEO Carol Bartz penned to the company, it is not even close to the same thing.

And, more to the point, if someone sent me emails jacked from Bartz’s own email account, I would not need even a second to know I would never use such information.

As I tweeted earlier today: A credible source a reporter knows giving accurate info is clearly different from a thief rifling through someone’s sock drawer.

That is especially true when you use material from a person you do not know. For the record: When I post a company memo, for example, I know and check out exactly who’s giving it to me and I don’t publish stuff just because it happens to land in my email box.

And, a minor beef, blaming victims for the theft by saying they have weak or inadequate passwords is also pathetic. It’s kind of like blaming people for being robbed because they had crappy locks.

I suppose there is a point in there, but the real finger of blame should always be firmly pointed at the burglar and those who fence his nicked goods.

That brings me to my final point–thinking you can handle dirty material and then act as if your hands are clean.

How hands get dirty is a concept even my children understand.

And if my kids ever said: “Hey, this stolen stuff is going to get out anyway, so let me be the one to ladle it out as I see fit”–I’d ground them for life.

BoomTown has had some good leaked internal memos from Yahoo, but I have never enjoyed one quite as much as this one from newly installed Yahoo PR head Eric Brown, who started today.

While it is clear that Yahoo (YHOO) has had its troubles in understanding and offering social-networking products to its users, Brown certainly knows how to share.

Yahoo could use some of that DNA!

New Yahoo CMO Elisa Steele named Brown, a colleague from her former job at NetApp (NTAP), as SVP of global communications at the Internet giant in June.

He was the VP of corporate relations at the data storage company, on whose board Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz has also served. Before that, he was at Adaptec (ADPT).

Brown is filling a slot left when former Yahoo PR head Jill Nash left Yahoo in February. She was briefly replaced by her deputy, Brad Williams, who was laid off from Yahoo in a recent round of cuts.

Like Steele, he is yet another executive from the business software arena to be hired under Bartz, who also comes from that background. Bartz also hired Jeff Russakow from Symantec (SYMC), which makes antivirus software and other security, for the post of Customer Advocacy SVP.

Yahoo’s whole marketing organization is undergoing a rejiggering under Steele, including a major brand overhaul. Along with Brown, she also recently hired Penny Baldwin as SVP of global integrated marketing and brand management.

Brown will be taking on Yahoo’s image-making, a task that has been a challenge over the last two years as the Silicon Valley icon has been buffeted by a series of external and internal challenges.

But Bartz has publicly talked about the need to now focus attention on Yahoo’s many assets and strengths.

In fact, in an onstage interview with me at the seventh D: All Things Digital conference in late May, Bartz said: “The best way to change the perception is to do a good job and then talk about it.”

From this memo, Brown seems like he knows how to do that.

And since he likes writers Kate Chopin and David Sedaris at the same time, it is obvious that Brown and I are on the path to become besties.

(Potential deal-breaker: I like piña coladas and getting caught in the rain.)

Here’s the memo–based on a form that sources tell me all Yahoo PR folks fill out in a getting-to-know-you questionnaire, but don’t make public–in which Brown says hello to his new team:

From: Eric Brown (SVP Global Communications)
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2009 6:00 PM
Subject: It’s great to be here!

Global comms team,

Thank you so much for the wonderful intro materials you gave me. I’m going to spend quite a bit of time on the org charts, budgets, plans, and results package you compiled for me. But I’ve been especially thrilled with the personal profiles you sent my way. I’ve seen other people whose phobias are the same as mine: spiders and heights; enjoyed how many of you put Paris as your favorite place on Earth; and am impressed with how many amazing books this group has collectively read.

I must also admit to being slightly intimidated by all of you who put “bad grammar” as a pet peeve and will triple check this email to avoid any grammar infractions…

I know I have a Thursday group meeting with you, but thought the least I could do on day one is return the favor and complete my own handbook profile. So here goes…

Date I joined Yahoo!: today (6 July 2009), though I did spend two days at the senior leaders meeting in mid-June and thank all of you who were there for the warm welcome in Half Moon Bay.

What I do here: lead a team of amazing, intelligent, motivated people who put Yahoo! in the best light possible and tell our story in compelling ways that make users and advertisers around the world want to embrace Yahoo! heartily.

Where I grew up: Warsaw, Virginia–a tiny town about 90 minutes from Richmond, Virginia and 150 minutes from Washington, D.C. For those of you who are American history buffs, Warsaw is about 10 minutes from the birthplace of Robert E. Lee and 15 minutes from the birthplace of George Washington.

Where I live now: Sunnyvale, California. Can’t beat the commute.

College: William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. BA in English. Loved lit crit. Senior honors thesis was on post-WWII masculinity in American society as represented by the works of Norman Mailer.

My first job: an internship for the U.S. Navy (my parents’ employer—they were civilians) analyzing different process flow diagram software packages for a team creating warship defense systems. For the rest of high school and college, I had LOTS more fun as a waiter at dive restaurant called The Stagecoach. The food was ghastly; the people were amazing.

What I did before Yahoo!: I ran comms (PR, social media, internal comms, and exec comms) for NetApp, managing a global team of about 60+ people doing amazing enterprise and B2B work in 30+ companies worldwide. I’m very excited to learn “consumer” from all of you–and equally excited to share experiences from my almost 20 years in the business in return.

What I do when I’m not here: I love travel (had a super 3 days in the Blue Mountains outside Sydney two weekends ago), cooking (yes, seriously—cooking is very therapeutic and relaxing for me), and reading (though I haven’t picked up a Norman Mailer since my undergrad days).

If the Internet didn’t exist, what I’d be doing right now: teaching literature to high school students. I believe that at some point in my life, I have to return to society what it has given me. And I’d be a better teacher than firefighter or doctor!

Favorite place on Earth: Paris. I try to go there 3 or 4 times a year and have a couple of very close friends who are kind enough to let me crash with them. Second favorite is Hong Kong.

Proudest accomplishment: professionally–being part of the “inner counsel circle” for NetApp execs on a variety of comms and marketing issues (which I hope to be here at Yahoo! as well); personally–being a good friend, partner, and family member.

Favorite Yahoo! moment: there have only been 3 days of them so far—and all have been great. I felt very honored and lucky to be part of the Half Moon Bay leadership summit–and meeting people from all over Yahoo! there was inspiring.

Favorite book: someone who majored in literature can’t just name one, so I’ll split them into categories…Favorite works of literature: The Scarlet Letter by Hawthorne, The Awakening by Kate Chopin, and To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Favorite work that kindled my imagination: The Hobbit by Tolkien. Favorite works that make me laugh: anything by David Sedaris (the man is wicked funny).

Favorite movie: two–Moulin Rouge and Orlando–both visually stunning.

My first car: a Buick Skyhawk in a horrible shade of brown–the thing was so ratty that I had to add oil to it every other day so it wouldn’t break down–it made its last hurrah on a cross-country trip from Virginia to California and made it over the Rocky Mountains without any issues but then was quite unhappy crossing the Sierra Nevada range.

My next vacation destination: somehow I think I’m going to be very busy for the next few months so I’m not planning any big trips, though I have told a friend I’ll attend his 50th birthday party in Munich and from there I’ll try to drive to Vienna for a few days.

My hidden talent: navigating subway systems when everyone else insists on taking a taxi (the exception: Tokyo–because it is just too darned crowded).

My favorite online video: I like online videos to catch up on things that MTV no longer carries–like videos from Gus Gus (though I only see one of their videos on Yahoo! Music…)

My guiltiest pleasure: ice cream in bed with the Kindle (yes, just as Elisa put in her email)–the ice cream HAS to be Ben & Jerry’s (LOVE being on this floor with the conference room names!) and my favorite is Peach Cobbler.

I have an intense fear of: spiders and heights–I even had a spider vacuum for a while so I didn’t have to come near ‘em or smash ‘em–but then I was scared they’d survive the suction and electric shock and crawl back somewhere–so now they’re routinely smashed.

My biggest pet peeve: beating around the bush–tell me what you want me to know because I’m not telepathic and say it without a lot of metaphor or subtlety–if you really want me to know something, please make it crystal clear.

My best celebrity encounter: dinner with friends in the outdoor section of the Restaurant du Palais Royal in Paris on a gorgeous May evening–next to us was Tom Ford (at the height of his Gucci power)–I have never wanted to NOT eat so much in my life.

Something few people know about me: I abhor cava (sorry to those of you in Spain)–champagne is my favorite drink on Earth, prosecco will do in a pinch, and New World sparklings are hit and miss–but I universally detest cava.

Best for advice for working with me (yes, a little changed from what you all submitted): honesty really IS the best policy–unless I’m having a bad hair day in which case please just don’t say anything about that at all.

Thanks again for having me here–and we’ll speak more on Thursday.

Best regards,
Eric

Adding the final leg of its new strategy to reinvigorate AOL, the Time Warner online unit said it was buying two small local start-ups, Patch Media and Going.

Each acquisition–which focuses on hyperlocal community news (Patch) and events (Going)–is small, about $10 million.

Ironically, local has previously been a big arena for AOL, which launched its Digital City unit with great fanfare more than a decade ago. AOL still runs Digital City, as well as its CityGuide listing offering.

But, in a move that will surely be scrutinized, Patch is a company whose principal investor has been AOL’s new CEO Tim Armstrong. AOL declined to say how much he had invested in the company, but sources said it was less than $5 million.

Armstrong addressed the issue in an internal memo to staff about the deal, noting he would forgo any profits from the AOL transaction for Patch and get back the seed money he put into the start-up in the form of AOL shares:

“On a personal note, I was an early investor in Patch and committed significant dollars to the vision of improving local communities with deeper online information, accountability through journalism, and a platform for communicating. In discussing our local strategy, AOL and Time Warner looked at Patch as a possible acquisition and I recused myself from that process. At the Time Warner negotiated acquisition price, I was in a position to earn a return on my investment in Patch. However, I have decided to forgo any profit from my seed investment in Patch and I have asked to receive just my seed capital in AOL shares once we separate from Time Warner.”

The New York-based Patch is a platform that does deeply localized coverage of communities about a range of topics, from announcements to news to events to obituaries. It is aimed at competing with local newspapers and other media.

In another interesting twist and blast from the past, Boston-based Going was funded–its last investment was $5 million in mid-2007–by two Web 1.0 portal execs, George Bell of Excite and Bob Davis of Lycos.

Both are now venture capitalists–Bell at General Catalyst Partners and Davis an Highand Capital Partners.

Going, which was originally called HeyLetsGo.com, connects its users with events and each other in a variety of big cities, such as San Francisco, Boston, Chicago and New York.

The focus on local will round out Armstrong’s new push for innovation at AOL, the final piece of his ongoing 100-day evaluation of the much-beleaguered company.

Armstrong has been busy in that time in making massive changes to the structure of AOL, sweeping aside its current set-up almost completely as it prepares for a spinoff from Time Warner (TWX).

That spinoff was announced recently and will result in AOL becoming a standalone company.

AOL’s new business strategy under Armstrong includes keeping its longtime access business, which many thought would be sold off, and putting many of the companies it has recently acquired–including its pricey Bebo social-networking site–in a separate ventures unit, which will try to attract outside investment.

The strategy will focus AOL on several key areas, including access, media/content, “scaled” advertising and communications, and now, local.

Local is also a big focus for players like Yahoo (YHOO) and Microsoft (MSFT) again. Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz specifically mentioned adding more community news, especially about local sports, to its offerings, in an onstage interview two weeks ago with me at the seventh D: All Things Digital conference.

Here’s the internal memo and press release about Patch and Going below:

AOLers –

Our strategy to win in the five areas we’ve discussed starts with innovation and passion. Of the five areas, Local remains the largest white space and offers us an ability to improve the lives of many consumers. It’s a space that’s prime for innovation and an area where we already have strength with a local network that reaches more than 54 million UVs a month and a valuable brand in mapping services, MapQuest.

Our vision isn’t just about optimizing what we have–it’s about overhauling how we approach this space, drawing on our legacy of connecting communities and our long history of organization through DMOZ. It’s about taking one of the most disaggregated experiences on the Web today and making it truly quick and easy for consumers to find the local information they need.

Today, we’re announcing two acquisitions that will enable us to better serve audiences by providing experiences that are highly focused on users’ own neighborhoods–Patch and Going.

Patch.com was built to provide local towns with a robust and interactive platform to publish news and information, with full-time journalists for each town covering government affairs, education issues, and community events. One of the AOLers in our All Hands meeting on May 29 asked what our plan is to help towns, like his, where the local newspaper has gone out of business. Patch is an acquisition that may eventually help that town. Under the leadership of co-founder and CEO Jon Brod, Patch has been able to launch five initial town sites since February and has just announced four additional communities. Moreover, Patch has already received over 230 user requests for “Patches” spanning 39 states and 12 countries.

The second acquisition is a small company located in Boston–Going. Going has developed a local events platform to discover and share information about things to do in a number of leading cities across the country. Under the leadership of CEO Evan Schumacher, Going has launched sites in 30 cities–including New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and Miami–and provides users with RSVP tools and advertisers with self-service event advertising.

On a personal note, I was an early investor in Patch and committed significant dollars to the vision of improving local communities with deeper online information, accountability through journalism, and a platform for communicating. In discussing our local strategy, AOL and Time Warner looked at Patch as a possible acquisition and I recused myself from that process. At the Time Warner negotiated acquisition price, I was in a position to earn a return on my investment in Patch. However, I have decided to forgo any profit from my seed investment in Patch and I have asked to receive just my seed capital in AOL shares once we separate from Time Warner.

Overall, I believe both Patch and Going will add strength and talent to our local efforts and give us an ability to have a unique and defendable local offering that helps people improve their lives. I’m excited that we’ve reached the stage where we can begin implementing in our five key strategy areas, and with today’s announcements we’re off to a great start in Local.

Please join me in welcoming the employees of Patch and Going to AOL and the future of AOL Local. –TA

AOL Acquires Two Local Services, Patch and Going

Acquisitions Add to AOL’s Leading Network of Local Services with a Community-Specific News and Information Platform and a Local Event Platform

NEW YORK, NY–June 11, 2009–AOL today announced two acquisitions in the local space: Patch Media Corporation, http://www.patch.com, a local news and information platform aimed at serving local towns and communities and Going, Inc., http://www.going.com, a local platform for people to discover and share information about things to do in a number of leading cities across the country. Both Patch and Going offer local experiences, content and self-service applications for consumers and advertisers.

“Local remains one of the most disaggregated experiences on the Web today–there’s a lot of information out there but simply no way for consumers to find it quickly and easily,” said Tim Armstrong, AOL’s Chairman and CEO. “It’s a space that’s prime for innovation and an area where AOL has a significant audience and a valuable mapping service in MapQuest. Going forward, local will be a core area of focus and investment for AOL. The acquisitions of Patch and Going will help us build out our local network further with excellent local services that enable people to stay better informed about what’s going on in their neighborhood.”

The acquisitions extend AOL’s network of local services, the largest online local network,* reaching more than 54 million total unique visitors per month.** Both acquisitions also leverage a consumer and marketplace trend toward greater consumption of news and information online.

A recent survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press found that more people now say they get most of their news from online sources than from traditional newspapers (40% vs. 35%).***

In addition, local searches grew 58% in 2008 year over year, while overall searches climbed just 21%, according to research conducted by the Yellow Pages Association in March 2009.

Local advertising (online and offline) represents an approximately $103 billion market (approximately 39% of total U.S. ad spending), according to Borrell Associates in 2009.

Founded in December 2007 and headquartered in New York, Patch combines localized, professional journalism with community contribution and a platform that puts all town assets online – in effect, digitizing the community. Patch, which expects to be available in a dozen communities by the end of the year, currently has “Patches” in five communities with four more in development.

“We are excited to join the AOL family,” said Jon Brod, CEO of Patch. “AOL’s substantial network will help us extend the reach of Patch into more and more communities. And Patch, as part of AOL’s local strategy, will create new opportunities for AOL to delight consumers and provide marketers access to highly targeted and deeply engaged audiences.”

Launched in September 2006 and headquartered in Boston, Going is one of the leading local communities for 20-somethings looking for things to do in cities across the country. Going is available in 30 leading U.S. cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami and Boston, with several more planned this year. Going also provides local promoters, event organizers and venues a fully automated, self-service RSVP, ticketing and advertising engine to maximize the attendance and value of their events.

“Going allows young people in leading cities to discover upcoming events, parties and new hot spots – and most importantly connect with others who share a similar lifestyle. By joining with AOL, we have the opportunity to greatly expand the reach of our platform to more cities both in the U.S. and around the world,” said Evan Schumacher, Going’s CEO.

“AOL has a legacy of connecting people to the content, community and services they care most about,” said Armstrong. “Patch and Going, combined with our existing network, will enable the company that got America online, to connect consumers around the globe to their communities online.”

* April 2009 U.S. comScore Media Metrix; Local Networks category is a custom built category by AOL.
** Custom AOL-defined Local Networks report, based on comScore U.S. Media Metrix Audience Duplication report (April 2009).
*** Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, “Internet Overtakes Newspapers as News Outlet,” December 2008.

Here’s Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes’s Memo on the AOL spinoff, which was approved by the media giant’s board last night and announced this morning.

BoomTown reported a lot of the deep details of the new structure of the online unit, which sweeps aside the previous one and includes a new venture unit.

Here’s the memo:

May 28, 2009

To: Time Warner Colleagues

From: Jeff Bewkes

Subject: Time Warner Announces Plan to Separate AOL

As you know, we’ve been working with AOL’s new management to move that company into the next phase of its evolution. To that end, we’ve been discussing the optimal ownership structure to enable AOL to fully realize its potential as a global Web services company. This morning, we announced that our Board of Directors has authorized management to proceed with plans for the complete legal and structural separation of AOL from Time Warner. Following the proposed transaction, which we aim to complete around the end of the year, AOL would be an independent, publicly traded company.

We believe that a separation will place both Time Warner and AOL in the best position to succeed, with greater operational and strategic flexibility. As an independent company, AOL should be a stronger competitor that is better able to deliver new and innovative products and services. At the same time, the separation will be another important step in the process we began last year of refocusing Time Warner to an even greater degree on our core content businesses.

For additional details about the proposed transaction, please click here to read the press release. I know you will have questions about this separation and how it may affect you and our company. We will provide more information as it becomes available over the coming months.

In the meantime, I’d like to thank the management and employees of AOL for the many contributions they have made, and continue to make, to our company. I’d also like to thank all Time Warner employees for your hard work and dedication. We’re making great progress toward our goals of building Time Warner into the world’s leading content company and improving our stockholders’ returns. With your continued support, I’m confident we have a bright future.

According to an internal memo obtained by BoomTown, Joanna Shields, who came to AOL via its troubled acquisition of the Bebo social-networking site, will be returning to London to spend more time with her family and to “pursue entrepreneurial interests.”

(She is pictured here with former AOL CEO Randy Falco and former AOL President Ron Grant after Bebo was bought in 2008.)

Until recently, People Networks has been the third leg of the Time Warner (TWX) online site’s businesses, which also include advertising and content.

But under new CEO Tim Armstrong, who was one of the top sales execs at Google (GOOG), AOL is largely abandoning its business-unit approach for a more functional and centralized structure.

Armstrong is prepping AOL to be spun off, and has been trying to shape it into a more streamlined organization focused on core assets but run in a more top-down fashion.

Bebo has always been a thorn at AOL, since it was acquired for $850 million last March. It was a huge price for the social-networking site, which was much smaller than leaders Facebook and MySpace.

Ironically, Shields, who negotiated the deal, got a lot of internal flak for getting that much for Bebo. That doubtlessly got worse after both top AOL execs who bought it from her, Falco and Grant, got pushed out in favor of Armstrong.

Under Shields, People Networks–which also includes AOL’s AIM and ICQ instant messenger services–has been introducing a variety of social products and updated offerings.

It is now poised, as you can read in Shields’s memo below, to release a new version of AIM and ICQ.

Here’s Armstrong’s full memo to the AOL troops below, as well as Shields’s memo to her staff:

Team -

We’re now near the half-way mark of our 100 Day Plan, and we’re making good progress in putting together the details behind the strategic priorities I talked with you about two weeks ago. I’m looking forward to speaking to you more about this later this week at a company All-Hands on Friday.

In the meantime, I want to update you on some organizational news. Joanna Shields has decided to step down from her role as President of People Networks/EVP of AOL and return to London to reunite her family and explore her entrepreneurial interests. At her core, Joanna is a start-up executive, having taken numerous companies through the process of rapid growth and acquisition.

Following the company’s acquisition of Bebo last year, where Joanna served as chief executive, she moved to New York to help AOL unlock the value of our social assets and re-establish AOL as a leader and innovator in the area of social networking and communications–two areas this company pioneered. The result was numerous innovations in AIM and ICQ, the launch of Socialthing, along with continued upgrades to Bebo. I’m happy to say that Joanna will continue to serve as an advisor to the company working with our acquisitions and new ventures, so while we won’t be seeing her on a daily basis, she will remain an important member of the AOL family.

Joanna is a very strong and well-known entrepreneur and has been a very valuable member of our executive team. Please join me in thanking Joanna for her many contributions and wishing her safe travels as she moves her family back to London–TA

Dear Team,

I wanted to let you know that after much deliberation and with a heavy heart I have decided to move on from AOL. I am returning home to London to reunite with my family and pursue my entrepreneurial interests.

It has been a remarkable year and I feel incredibly lucky to have spent this time with you. I have been blessed to be part of many success stories in the past from RealNetworks and Google through to Bebo and my time with you at AOL will go down as one of my proudest.

People Networks was born a year ago to solve some of the toughest problems facing online consumers today. Despite (and perhaps because of) all the innovation we’ve seen in the last few years there are too many online services to monitor, too many profiles to manage and too many “social graphs” to maintain. The web is an amazing platform for content, community and communications, but these three rarely happen in one place, resulting in online conversations that are fragmented and disconnected. Our vision was to connect people with everyone and everything they care about and through a combination of great talent, hard work and brilliant assets we managed to create some amazing experiences to do just that.

We started with our industry-leading products AIM and ICQ and are now just about ready to re-invent instant messaging as the world knows it to become the default product for both private and public conversations and social and status updates. We leveraged the incredible passion and talent at Bebo, launching numerous innovations and expanding into 7 new countries while maintaining our leadership in user engagement and innovative monetization. And finally, we assembled a small, yet powerful group of entrepreneurs, to build a platform for socializing the web in record time, receiving rave reviews from publishers and partners working with the Socialthing team. I can’t wait for the world to get a glimpse of our new client this summer combined with the evolution of Socialthing as it finally creates a way for conversations and social interactions to happen anywhere on the web.

You should all feel proud of your role in our success.

I wanted to say thank you for everything I’ve learned from you this past year. I loved the fact that we challenged each other every day, from our offsites and product summits to our Thinktanks and day-to-day meetings. In the end we came up with phenomenal products that will make a lasting impact–and we are just on the verge of revealing these plans. I feel so privileged to have had the opportunity to think with all of you, to break down the barriers of the old ways, to innovate again and to re-invigorate this company. I believe in you and I am so very proud of you all. Don’t let the constant swirl of changes around you take you off course. Feel confident about the decisions we have made and the path we are on. Stay focused on delivering the products you believe in and I know you will win.

I leave you in capable hands with Tim and I know he will continue to support you. I remain, as always your friend.

Joanna

A major Yahoo investor yesterday told me that he liked what he saw so far from new Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz, but he still remained wary.

“I like the sizzle,” he said, referring to Bartz’s decisive take-no-prisoners style. “But I am still waiting to see if steak is there too.”

Well, Bartz handed over some tough news to chew on today, announcing Yahoo’s first-quarter earnings, which were just as weak as expected.

The company reported an eight-cent-per-share profit, down from 37 cents a year ago, a 78 percent drop.

Revenue in the quarter came in at $1.6 billion, a 13 percent decline from last year’s $1.8 billion.

And Yahoo (YHOO) also said it would cut five percent of its staff of 13,600, which means layoffs of close to 700 employees.

BoomTown liveblogged the Yahoo earnings conference call, with Bartz and outgoing CFO Blake Jorgensen.

(Bartz, well known for her ribald words and sassy phrases, lobbed several, and also tossed out a small F-bomb at the very end of the conference call, so read on to the bottom.)

2:04 p.m.: The call started off a few minutes late, but who can blame Yahoo, given the poor results? But Bartz finally came on the call with an upbeat tone.

“What an amazing and busy three months it’s been,” she said, outlining what she had learned so far on her whirlwind visits across the Yahoo empire and “deep dives” into the products and services of the troubled Internet giant.

“The most important takeaway was the importance of having a ‘Wow!’ experience,” concluded Bartz, who noted the definition of that particular enthusiasm was different, depending on who you were.

“Wow!” did not describe the earning results, to be sure.

But we pressed on.

2:08 p.m.: Bartz noted that Yahoo remained focused on investment and also renewed investment in the company.

She pointed to content, email, search and advertising as key building blocks of Yahoo and focused on three key goals:

1) Globalizing the Yahoo platform

2) Building “fantastic products” that deeply impact users

3) Investing in “industry-leading” online ad solutions

You know, getting back to basics of exactly what made Yahoo great before.

2:09 p.m.: Bartz complimented Yahoo CTO and Product head Ari Balogh, as well as other current Yahoo staff at the Silicon Valley-based company.

Then she announced that Yahoo had hired Jeff Russakow (pictured here) as its new customer advocacy head.

I am guessing he is now the key guy in charge of monitoring the “Wow!” level.

Russakow is currently VP of corporate strategy for Symantec, the online security software firm, which does not trumpet Yahoo! to me.

So, I wonder if Yahoo engineers should build a “Wow!” meter to help Jeff?

Bartz then noted that Yahoo has been and will continue to “slim down our portfolio,” while continuing in investing.

That would mean dumping the non-”Wow!”

2:11 p.m.: CFO Jorgensen hopped on, noting the “difficult economic environment.”

We noticed!

Jorgensen then proceeded to go through the unimpressive numbers for a while, in a voice that lulled me into a slight stupor. There was essentially no good news anywhere for Yahoo.

Then, he summed up and said goodbye, as he is leaving Yahoo soon and there will be a new CFO by the next quarter’s call. Jorgensen said he will be watching Yahoo “with interest.”

Blake! We hardly knew you! Call me anytime and we’ll chat and maybe have lunch (bring lots of internal memos!).

2:20 p.m.: Bartz complimented Jorgensen, although she did kind of “part ways” with him.

Then, finally, came a patented Bartzism, which is that special sassy phrase or ribald word, with her noting that users were looking for a “kick-ass” experience from Yahoo.

She obviously could not resist, which was a good instinct.

Bartz soon threw in a “freakin’” too.

Then, she non-answered anticipated questions about Yahoo’s talks with Microsoft over a search and advertising partnership by noting, “search is a very valuable asset for Yahoo.”

And that, she said, in a Forrest Gumpism, “is all we’re going to say about search today.”

Also, life is a box of chocolates.

2:25 p.m.: Bartz then discussed the economy, especially the impact on branded display advertising, which she said was not going to be killed off.

Brands were always important, she noted, and Yahoo could even help damaged brands revive themselves.

Like, um, maybe, Yahoo?

She closed the talking points part of the call on another upbeat note: “Let me say again how happy I am to be here.”

Us too, cuz Bartz is a definitely a live wire, as it later turned out.

(Bartz also announced an analysts day on Oct. 28.)

2:29 p.m.: Now began questions from said analysts (media folks are muted, of course).

The first was about ad price differences, which was dull.

The second, though, touched on the Microsoft (MSFT) talks, with someone essentially asking if Bartz was smart enough about search to be able to entertain an offer.

Well, what do you think she was going to say?

That’s right: “I am well versed enough in the search business to say it is critical to Yahoo.”

Bartz also noted that she thought advertisers prefer a combined search and display experience, which felt like she was channeling Yahoo EVP Hilary Schneider.

But Bartz also managed to keep the door open, saying–and I just know she had a mischievous smile while she said this–“Relative to anything else related to Microsoft, no comment.”

She was also not gaming the economy, noting that no one knows what will happen in the future.

“A wise person stays to the sides and lets the economists figure it out,” said Bartz.

As if!

2:33 p.m.: More questions were asked about costs and layoffs (sad!) and about ad inventory.

Bartz underscored the importance of its premium ad sales staff and placement over ad networks and randomness.

“Chanel does not want to end up next to Harley-Davidson. It kind of doesn’t work,” she asserted.

Well, it works for me! I mean, black leather and more black leather–what’s not to like?

2:39 p.m.: More about globalizing the Yahoo platform, which Bartz said would take a while.

“It’s not like flipping a switch,” she said. “This is work, this is not just words.”

Bartz also talked about how non-easy the current ad management systems at Yahoo are. Several times.

2:46 p.m.: A question then came about reinvestment, which was really about selling off stuff like the Asian assets.

No answers were forthcoming, although weak product groups are getting tossed off the good ship Yahoo quite quickly under Bartz.

More questions about the economy, the ad business and another attempt to find out about the Microsoft talks.

“Search is important,” to consumers and advertisers of Yahoo, Bartz underscored again, noting she was not going to fall for a “tricky” question.

Good lord, she’s a sharpie.

3:03 p.m.: Last up is a question about the investment in the global platform and the reorganization.

And, in the end, Bartz uttered the naughty word many had expected sooner.

It came when Bartz was on a roll about how engineers have been “scattered to the winds” at Yahoo and that there have been too many product managers overseeing things and annoying those windswept engineers.

She was dead right about this nagging issue at the company, as it has slowed down innovation and rollouts of key services and products.

“Nobody’s f#*king doing anything,” Bartz stated with apparent exasperation.

She tried to take it back quickly, adding, “I knew that would slip out some time.”

But Bartz should not take it back. Never ever.

In fact, most would agree that it was well past time that such an assessment should slip out of Yahoo.