Bye, Bye Yang: Yahoo! CEO Finally Steps Down

Jerry Yang finally has agreed to quit his post as Yahoo! Inc.’s  (YHOO) CEO.

It’s past time. The Internet company’s stocks have fallen to a third of the price-per-share Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) offered to pay for a buyout; there’s no apparent strategy for success; and shareholders are very – make that, very ─ unhappy with Yang. Well, until today, that is. Yahoo!’s stock is up more than 10 percent on news of Yang’s resignation.

Now the vetting for a new CEO begins. An All Things Digital columnist puts Peter Chermin, president and COO of News Corp., at the top of the heap. A ZDNet blogger thinks billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn, who sits on the Yahoo! board, fits the bill. (We don’t really see that happening. Icahn likes to have his fingers in too many pies at the same time to focus on running a single company.)

Yang will have a say in who replaces him … and we rather wonder if he shouldn’t. He did handpick Hollywood exec Terry Semel, who did a disastrous job as CEO. And Yang hasn’t had the greatest run himself. After all, just because someone can start a successful company doesn’t mean he or she will operate said company successfully. Anyway. Yang will remain on the Yahoo! board and work for the company in a strategy role as, er, Chief Yahoo. He’ll probably have a cube in a dark corner where disgruntled fellow Yahoos can’t find him.