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Tag: Yahoo
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Whole Foods, but not the whole story
So, now we know how at least one corporate CEO got his kicks. For years, he posted on financial bulletin boards, under an alias, sometimes criticizing the competition.
“I posted on Yahoo! under a pseudonym because I had fun doing it,” Whole Foods CEO John Mackey acknowledged on his company’s Web site last night. “I never intended any of those postings to be identified with me.”
Mackey used the pseudonym “Rahodeb,” a variation on his wife’s name, Deborah, from 1999 until last summer The New York Times reported.
The FTC, which is trying to block Whole Foods’ acquisition of another organic grocer, Wild Oats, disclosed the pseudonym in a footnote in a court document. Using his alias, Mackey had posted about Wild Oats.
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Ann Fudge’s lengthy resumeOctober 8, 2010 at 8:24am
While there doesn’t appear to be a front-runner to replace Lawrence Summers as President Obama’s chief economic adviser, most lists of potential candidates include Ann Fudge.
Microsoft confirms it could renew its effort to buy all of Yahoo!
As dissident shareholder Carl Icahn warned that Yahoo! is “moving toward a precipice” and “it is time for a change,” Microsoft said today it could renew its effort to buy Yahoo! The catch: First Yahoo! shareholders must vote in a new slate of directors at their Aug. 1 meeting.
Hint: Click in map to explore connectionsStory continues below interactive map
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In its statement today, Microsoft said it concluded there was no possibility of doing a deal with the current Yahoo! board members.
“We confirm, however, that after the shareholder election Microsoft would be interested in discussing with a new board a major transaction with Yahoo!, such as either a transaction to purchase the “Search” function with large financial guarantees or, in the alternative, purchasing the whole company,” the statement said.
Henry Blodget, writing at Alleyinsider.com, said if there is a new offer for all of Yahoo! it won’t be near the previous offer of $33. “There’s no reason in the world they should pay more than $27,” he wrote.
Will Smith invests in PluggedIn, new music video site
Three of the biggest companies in the music industry will be providing content for web-newcomer PluggedIn, which offers high-definition music videos and concerts to be streamed online for free.
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Other investors include PluggedIn’s founding partners Kevin Welk and Brett O’Brien.
PluggedIn intends to do for music videos and concerts what YouTube does for user-created content and Hulu does for TV shows. The company announced yesterday that its users will have access to content from Universal Music Group, as well as EMI and Sony BMG.
The site describes itself as evolving from a “from a rare partnership between proven Internet entrepreneurs and successful music industry executives.”
Jeff Somers, PluggedIn’s CEO, previously worked for Zillow.com, a website that estimates real estate values by address. He formerly worked in vendor relations for Amazon.com.
Co-founders of PluggedIn include XDrive founder Brett O’Brien and chief marketing officer JJ Aguhob. XDrive was purchased by AOL in 2005. Kevin Welk, the CEO of Vanguard and Sugar Hill Records is also a founding partner.
Nicola Marzolla, a former Yahoo software engineer, is an engineer for PluggedIn.
PluggedIn’s content includes more than 10,000 free music videos, some of which can be streamed in high definition.
Users can also save videos and photos of artists such as U2, Jay-Z, Amy Winehouse and Rihanna. PluggedIn also plans on serving as a social network, allowing users to connect to one another by sharing created playlists.
The new content that PluggedIn is able to provide is the HD videos provided by EMI, Universal Music Group, and Sony BMG. The rest of their artist information comes from other websites.
YouTube links are provided to fill in the gaps in music video and TV offerings. PluggedIn links to Amazon, StubHub and eBay to purchase music, concert tickets, ringtones and other merchandise. Artist bios are mostly provided by All Music Guide, and news listings go to outside sites such as MTV.com and newspapers. PluggedIn also offers content from Wikipedia and blogs.
Will PluggedIn provide enough original content for users to be satisfied with the service they plan to offer? Considering the site doesn’t even have the HD music videos of investor Will Smith’s anthems Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It and Miami, PluggedIn’s success may be determined by future content acquisition.
Clinton’s Mark Penn still favors micro over macro
It may be too early for the post-mortems on the presidential campaign of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-NY.
But given her troubles of late, the pre-mortems are rolling in.
There’s enough blame to go around, but Mark Penn, Clinton’s chief strategist and pollster, is taking a lot of the hits. (Story continues below interactive map.)
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“No matter how much bad stuff happened, (Clinton) kept to her Bush playbook, stubbornly clinging to her own Rumsfeld, her chief strategist, Mark Penn,” wrote Frank Rich in Sunday’s The New York Times.In a sense, though, who could blame her?
Penn, the CEO of a large and powerful public relations firm, Burson-Marsteller, knows campaigns, people and voting trends.
Drawn to Bill Clinton’s team by Dick Morris, he helped fashion President Clinton’s 1996 re-election. Penn was also a leader in Hillary Clinton’s successful senatorial campaign in 2000.
And he guided Britain’s Tony Blair to his third re-election as prime minister, just as he put Israel’s Menachem Begin in the win column.
But the question remains, how did Penn lose his touch this time around, if, in fact, he did?
For one thing, analysts suggest, he read his own book, Microtrends: The Forces Behind Tomorrow’s Big Changes.
In Microtrends, Penn and co-author E. Kinney Zalesne divide the American public into emerging demographic categories. (Stay-at-home workers, etc.)
“There is no One America any more, or Two or Three or Eight,” Penn writes. “In fact, there are hundreds of Americas, hundreds of new niches made up of people drawn together by common interests.”
Politicians and corporations like this kind of analysis, as it gives them groups to target.
However, Obama and his advisers have placed far more emphasis on the macro over the micro. Their message of unity and change essentially argues that there could be one America.
Penn may say that the numbers don’t back this up. At least for now, many voters are saying something different.
Confident in his numbers, and willing to go on the attack, Penn has not been shy about appearing before the cameras. But his take-no-prisoners style may not have played well this time around.
He drew flak in December for what seemed to be a clumsy attempt to tag Obama with youthful cocaine use.
And Penn didn’t win any points recently for saying that Obama’s primary wins, with the exception of his victory in Illinois, weren’t in “significant” states. (Take that, Wisconsin and South Carolina.)
In addition, given the attention last week paid to Sen. John McCain’s connections to lobbyists, it’s not surprising that Penn has become example A of Clinton’s connections to lobbyists.
Penn is such a Washington insider, in fact, that he’s the nominal boss of Charles R. Black Jr., a key McCain adviser and spokesman.
Black is the chairman of BKSH & Associates, a lobbying firm that is a subsidiary of Burson-Marsteller, the company Penn heads.
Another of Penn’s companies, the polling firm, Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates, has been paid at least $4 million by the Clinton campaign and is owed millions more. Some have suggested that this means Penn wins even if his candidate loses.
Despite Clinton’s recent run of defeats, Penn continues to argue that she can emerge as the ultimate winner.
In a Feb. 13 memo, he predicted that the demographics in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas, states that hold primaries on March 4, favor Clinton.
If Penn is right, and Clinton does well in those three, the media could then turn to blaming David Axelrod, Obama’s chief strategist. He’s a man who has been praised so far for being alert to macro-trends, the other side of the demographic coin.
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Obama, Clintons court Gov. Bill Richardson
New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, who quit the presidential race Jan. 10, says Barack Obama calls him every three days or so and that about 10 supporters of Hillary Clinton call him on a typical day.
Their goal: obtain his endorsement for president.
The New York Times says Richardson is one of the biggest prospective endorsers in the Democratic Party because he is a former candidate, Hispanic governor and a superdelegate.
Richardson tells the newspaper that he is “genuinely torn.” He says he may make an endorsement next week, or not at all. (Story continues below interactive map.)
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Of the attention, Richardson told The Times, “I want to make it clear that I’m not annoyed by any of this.”
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5 Comments
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Don’t endorse either one, Gov. Richardson. As they continue to woo you, they will become more certain how valuable your service to our country has been, continues to be, and can be in the future.
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Gov Rischardson, your state voted for Hillary and showed tremedous support for Clinton. Please for our sake, endorse Hillary. Please endorse Hillary.
Go Hillary. These dudes are nuts.
Obama is an abomination
Obama is a diaster
Obama is an empty shirt
Obama is a plagiarist
Obama is two faced
Obama is nothing but words (& not even his own)
Obama is a fraud
Obama is an opportunist
Obama = No you cantHILLARY IN 08
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THERE IS ONLY ONE CORRECT VOTE! HILLARY CLINTON! DON’T LET THIS COUNTRY DISTRUCT, WHAT IS WRONG WITH WITH ALL YOU AMERICAN’S? AT LEAST THE ONES WITH BRAIN.
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Richardson is a piece of crap! His career is owed to Clintons and he is holding off like he is somebody!
Jerk
I am glad people showed he is a crap and didn’t vote for him
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I hope very much that Governor Richardson will not endorse either candidate, and, instead, express honestly to each his desire to serve our country through the Presidency of either Hillary or Obama. I feel the same about John Edwards, Joe Biden, and Chris Dodd. We Democrats were blessed with so many wonderful candidates this year. It is really sad to see everything end in such acrimony. Each of these former candidates, as well as even Dennis Kucinich, could make valuable contributions to the next Presidency, and I do not think it is fair to pressure former candidates to endorse. My first choices, actually, were John Edwards and Bill Richardson; I gave money to each campaign, and hope very much that Richardson and Edwards in particular will be utilized strategically in the next administration.
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Federal Reserve’s Fisher still fears inflation
Richard Fisher, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and the Fed’s top anti-inflation hawk, cautioned again that the central bank must be wary of “stirring the embers of inflation.”
Speaking at the Petroleum Club in Fort Worth Friday, Fisher called the nation’s economic growth “anemic,” but said the economy is not in recession and he doubted there would be sustained negative growth.
“There is a lowering of expectations for growth,” he said, “but it is positive economic growth.” (Story continues below interactive map.)
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His academic background is impressive: Two years at the U.S. Naval Academy, then Harvard, Oxford and Stanford, where he earned an MBA. He is also a former vice chairman of Kissinger McLarty Associates, a firm chaired by former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
Fisher was the only member of the Federal Open Market Committee to vote against the half-point interest rate reduction in late January. Lower rates can foster inflation.
Interesting note: The Star-Telegram in Fort Worth reported that Fisher said 31 percent of all the non-governmental jobs created in the United States in 2007 were created in Texas.
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For Patricia Cornwell, philanthropy has its price
Crime novelist Patricia Cornwell has learned that even generosity can need an explanation.
Cornwell donated $1 million to the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City this month.
But worried that some of her remarks about the gift might be read as demeaning police officers, Cornwell last week spent $250,000 to set the record straight. (Story continues below interactive map.)
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In an full page ads in the Feb. 15 editions of The New York Times, The Washington Post and USA Today, Cornwell wrote that she was “dismayed by recent news accounts” concerning her gift to establish a Crime Scene Academy at John Jay.She went on to write, “what has been publicized certainly does not accurately reflect my deep respect and admiration for … hardworking law enforcement professionals.”
Her concern was caused by a quotation from her that appeared in an Associated Press story on her gift. The quotation could have been read to imply that Cornwell had seen police officers doing their jobs badly.
“I’ve seen cops walk through blood,” the AP reported her as saying. “I’ve seen them leave their fingerprints on a window. I’ve seen bloody clothing put in a plastic bag, instead of a paper bag, so it decomposes.”
Cornwell told the Post in an interview that her words were taken out of context.
She said she had been talking with the AP reporter about what she had seen citizens do at crime scenes and a “misunderstanding” had developed.
And she also stressed to the Post that she was donating to John Jay in the interest of giving police officers the necessary training they need to avoid mistakes at crime scenes.
Cornwell told the Times that she purchased the newspaper ads as “a quarter-of-a-million-dollar pre-emptive strike.”
“I went into emergency mode,” she said. “I said, ‘You know what, this is going to be a disaster. It is going to be everywhere. Who knows what else is out there because these articles are all over the world.’”
A former crime reporter and a worker in a medical examiner’s office, Cornwell, 51, gained fame through her series of novels featuring Kay Scarpetta, a medical examiner.
The second-highest-selling female novelist after J.K. Rowling, Cornwell has written other crime novels that don’t feature Scarpetta.
Before she began the Scarpetta series, Cornwell was the author of A Time for Remembering, a biography of Ruth Bell Graham, the wife of the Rev. Billy Graham.
She also wrote Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper – Case Closed. The 2002 non-fiction work argues that painter Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper.
Cornwell is reported to be the subject of the forthcoming Twisted Triangle, a non-fiction account of her alleged 1990s relationship with Marguerite Bennett, an FBI agent and instructor.
Bennett’s husband, FBI agent Eugene Bennett, was convicted in 1997 of attempting to murder his wife. He was sentenced to 23 years in prison. His lawyers had argued that his discovery of an affair between his wife and Cornwell lead him to lose his sanity.
In 2005, Cornwell married Dr. Staci Gruber of the Harvard Medical School, soon after same-sex marriages were permitted in Massachusetts.
Cornwell’s gift to John Jay echoes earlier gifts by her in support of forensic science to the Virginia Institute of Forensic Science and Medicine and to the National Forensic Academy at the University of Tennessee.
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McCain’s lawyer is accustomed to spotlight
Even before he gets the presidential nomination, Sen. John McCain has done something presidential.
Like former President Bill Clinton, McCain has hired high-profile lawyer Robert S. Bennett to help him get by a little scandal. (Story continues below interactive map.)
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Bennett is doing damage control for McCain in the wake of a story first published on The New York Times website Wednesday.
The story, published in the print edition today, suggests McCain may have had a romantic relationship with a lobbyist several years ago. It also suggests that McCain may have used his position to benefit her clients.
The story reports that McCain aides were worried about the appearance of a relationship between McCain and Vicki Iseman, a telecommunications lobbyist.
McCain today said the story is “not true” and that Iseman is simply a friend.
Defending McCain, Bennett, who was once described as having a “proven rapport with the media,” appeared on television and was widely quoted in print.
“There is no evidence that John McCain ever breached the public trust, and that is the issue and the only issue,” he told NBC’s Today show today.
On Fox News Wednesday night, Bennett called the Times story “a real hit job.”
Howard Kurtz, media columnist for The Washington Post, had written in December that McCain had hired Bennett to deal with rumors that linked McCain to a then unidentified media lobbyist.
“What is being done to John McCain is an outrage,” Bennett told Kurtz then. He also said that he had sent the Times answers to questions about the rumored affair.
In comments Wednesday and today in the wake of the Times story, Bennett alleges that the newspaper ignored many examples he supplied of times when McCain had taken stances unfavorable to Iseman’s clients.
Writing today, Kurtz states that “the McCain/Bennett strategy, of course, is to make the Times the issue.”
Whatever the strategy, Bennett has substantial experience trying his cases in the court of public opinion.
In addition to representing Clinton, Bennett represented Paul Wolfowitz, whose time as the head of the World Bank was cut short because of allegations that he used his influence on behalf of his girlfriend.
Bennett was also the lawyer for New York Times reporter Judith Miller, who was charged with contempt of court for not revealing a source. And, in other cases, he represented Clark Clifford, the former secretary of defense, and Caspar Weinberger, also a former secretary of defense.
The brother of William Bennett, the conservative commentator and former Secretary of Education, Robert Bennett is a graduate of Harvard Law School and a former federal prosecutor.
A former boxer, he’s also the author of In the Ring: The Trials of a Washington Lawyer.
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High-profile lawyer takes Britney’s case
Britney Spears has yet another new lawyer in the custody battle for sons Sean Preston and Jayden James Federline.
Stacy D. Phillips will represent Spears, facing off against Kevin Federline’s lawyer, Mark Vincent Kaplan. Phillips previously has represented celebrity clients such as Bobby Brown and Darryl Strawberry, as well as the ex-spouses of Axl Rose, Tori Spelling, and Jean-Claude Van Damme. (Story continues below interactive map.)
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Sorrell Trope, Spears’s last lawyer, had asked twice to be dismissed from the case. When he first tried to withdraw, he cited a breakdown of communication with Spears that made “further representation of her interests impossible.”In a statement to People magazine, Trope explained, “We filed papers asking to be relieved, and hopefully they will find someone to replace us.”
A new lawyer is one of many changes for Spears in the last month. After she left the Stewart and Lynda Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA on Feb. 6, the court ruled that her father, Jamie Spears, would be named as her temporary co-conservator, giving him legal control of his daughter’s affairs. Britney’s brother, Bryan Spears, is also a co-trustee of her estate.
Her parents have since taken charge of the pop star’s business and personal relationships. Howard Grossman, Spears’s business manager, was fired by her father. Her mother, Lynne, has requested a restraining order against Spears’s frequent companion and self-proclaimed manager, Osama Lutfi. Lynne Spears claimed he was verbally abusing and drugging Britney.
Two other lawyers have claimed they were representing Spears. Adam Streisand (a second cousin to Barbra) met with Spears to discuss her rights after Jamie Spears was named temporary conservator. However, because Spears does not have the legal power to determine her own representation, Streisand removed himself from her case.
Jon Eardley also claims to be representing Spears. This week, he spoke to People about his belief that Spears is being “deprived of her Constitutional rights” and his desire to take her case to a federal court.
Unlike Eardley, Stacy Phillips’s representation of Spears was approved by a court commissioner yesterday.
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J.C. Watts mentioned as possible VP
The Democratic Party will make history this year, nominating either a woman or an African-American for president.
But there’s speculation that the Republicans could make history, as well, not in nominating Sen. John McCain to run for president, but in choosing a vice presidential candidate.
Some conservative commentators, and at least one website, are urging McCain to select former Oklahoma Congressman J.C. Watts Jr. as his running mate. (Story continues below interactive map.)
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The former University of Oklahoma football star is now the head of several companies and a member of a handful of corporate boards. In addition, he’s a commentator on CNN and a sought-after motivational speaker.
“This is the right man for Senator McCain, at the right time,” suggests the website Draft J.C. Watts for Vice President.
The double use of the word “right” is probably no accident. Watts is politically to the right of McCain and a star among conservatives.
Were he on the ticket, his supporters argue, some voters would feel more comfortable voting for McCain, who has some conservative opposition.
Watts’s supporters also contend that Watts might serve as a counter to Sen. Barack Obama were the Illinois senator to get the Democratic presidential nomination.
Both Watts and Obama are African-American, just as they are dynamic speakers, Watts’s backers say.
Obama became a national star after his speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. Watts came into his own because of his speech to the 1996 Republican National Convention.
At that time, Watts was a first-term congressman from a predominantly white and Democratic district of Oklahoma. He went on to serve three more terms. He was the fourth-highest ranking Republican in the House of Representatives when he left at the end of 2002.
A native of Oklahoma who grew up in poverty, Watts quarterbacked the University of Oklahoma to victories in the 1980 and 1981 Orange Bowls. He then played six years in the Canadian Football League.
Returning to Oklahoma, Watts first served as a youth minister and then an associate minister in a Baptist church. In 1990, he was elected to the Oklahoma Corporations Commission, a regulatory agency. Later, he became chairman of the commission.
In 1991, Watts was one of 10 people focused on by the Justice Department during an investigation of bribery allegations related to the commission. He was not charged with any wrongdoing, and he stressed at the time that the investigation was directed at the commission and not at him.
Watts also received negative publicity from financial problems in Oklahoma in the 1980s. His investment in an oil business went bad, and he had some bad debts and unpaid taxes.
“Guilty as charged,” Watts told The New York Times when asked about the debts, all of which he paid.
After leaving Congress, Watts formed J.C. Watts Companies, LLC, the parent company for several other concerns, including Watts Consulting Group, a lobbying firm.
Watts Consulting has represented NASCAR, Wells Fargo, Deere & Company, the Republic of Senegal and historically black colleges and universities.
Watts’s company also owns Mustang Equipment, a John Deere dealership in San Antonio and Marble Falls, Tex.
According to its website J.C. Watts Companies had revenues of $25 million in 2005.
McCain has not mentioned specific people as possible vice presidential picks. He and Watts are said to be friends. However, earlier in the campaign season, Watts appeared to be backing former Sen. Fred Thompson for the Republican presidential nomination.
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Thank you very much for the mention… Congressman Watts is the RIGHT man at the RIGHT time indeed.
Those who agree should go to the site and sign the petition:
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Cerberus: The public face of private investment
Stephen Feinberg, the very private founder of Cerberus Capital Management, hates attention. He even put it in writing.
As Andrew Ross Sorkin of the New York Times notes, in Dealbook, Feinberg sent a memo to investors last month, saying: “We despise all the public attention we are getting. We do our best to avoid the spotlight, but, unfortunately, when you do some large deals, such as Chrysler and GMAC, it is hard to avoid.” (Story continues below interactive map.)
MAP HINTS: Click expands a name. Control+Click centers map on a name. Solid lines are current relations. Dotted lines are former relations. For advanced tools choose Tools > Options from the menu at top. More help. Not seeing the maps? Please go here to check for the latest version of Java.Feinberg does his best to avoid the limelight, sending out more polished speakers as his surrogates, including former Treasury Secretary John W. Snow and former Vice President Dan Quayle.
Quayle has won more credibility in the business world than he ever mustered in politics. In addition to his role as chairman of Cerberus Global Investments, he sits on the board of ski maker K2 Inc. and Aozora Bank of Tokyo. (The bank was part of the Cerberus-led consortium that acquired GMAC.)
Snow was treasury secretary under George W. Bush and a transportation official in the Ford administration. As chairman of Cerberus, he often handles company speaking engagements.
Last July, addressing the National Press Club, he offered a 21st-century adaptation of Gordon Gecko’s philosophy on greed. Debt, Snow said, is good.
“Now sometimes people think of ‘debt’ or leverage as bad,” Snow told the crowd. “In reality, corporate debt and equity are flip sides of the same coin. Both represent positive investments that can create jobs. Debt represents the confidence of the bond markets – people don’t lend money if they don’t have the expectation of a positive return.”
Yet there are widespread fears about the returns on Cerberus investments. “Indeed,” Sorkin writes, “if there is one buyout portfolio that Wall Street worries about most, it is Cerberus’.”
Failure with such a major investment as Chrysler would bring more public scrutiny than Feinberg could bear.
Remember the congressional bailout of the company in 1979? Another bankruptcy threat, brought about by private investment and a belief in debt, would result in Capitol Hill hearings that make the Roger Clemens–Brian McNamee testimony look like child’s play.
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Questions about Countrywide-Bank of America deal
Countrywide Financial reported Friday that its mortgage foreclosure rate doubled last month compared to a year ago.
That prompted the Charlotte Business Journal to ask Bank of America if it was going forward with its roughly $4 billion stock deal to acquire Countrywide, the nation’s largest mortgage lender.
Yes, responded a spokesman for Bank of America, which is based in Charlotte. “We conducted extensive due diligence,” he told the Business Journal. (Story continues below interactive map.)
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In its story about Countrywide’s increased foreclosure rate, The Wall Street Journal reported that Bank of America’s takeover still has several hurdles. The Journal said SRM Global Master Fund LP plans to vote against the deal because it undervalues Countrywide.
SRM, a hedge fund, holds 5.5 percent of Countrywide, founded by CEO Angelo Mozilo in 1969.
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