OT: Meg Whitman Former CEO

[rdwyer]

Meg Whitman didn't care enough to vote when she was younger. So her bid to run for Calif. Governor is now in jeopardy. (Others want her to step down) Great way to run a campaign. Negative feedback on her first sale.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/0..._n_165075.html

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by rdwyer

Meg Whitman didn't care enough to vote when she was younger. So her bid to run for Calif. Governor is now in jeopardy. (Others want her to step down) Great way to run a campaign. Negative feedback on her first sale.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/0..._n_165075.html

Gad, not another clueless celeb...wasn't the Teutonic Twit enough?

[FrankWakefield]

If she was the lady who was in charge of eBay for the last several years, during what I consider to be its decline (I think it was a MUCH better place 9 years ago, for both buyer and seller); then I think she's well suited to guide California along the financial course that the state has apparently taken the last few years. Maybe eBay could take over California, or the other way around, and the two could combine business efforts. I'd see nothing wrong with a California Store on eBay. A fellow could upload an image of himself and "buy" himself a driver's license...

[scgaynor]

She was in charge in Ebay's glory days. My guess is that if she was in charge now, she would not have blinders on like the current CEO and she would not be trying to turn Ebay into Amazon Lite.

scott

[slidekellyslide]

Yep, it's the current CEO of ebay that is intent on destroying the auction aspect of ebay. Whitman (even though I don't agree with her politics) was a good leader at ebay and if she can translate that into governing a state she could be good for California.

[judsonhamlin]

-1 Would not do business with again

[D. Bergin]

Donahue was groomed by Whitman to be doing exactly what he is right now. "Glory Days" just means she was in charge when the stock went public and she could get out with a multi-hundred million $ severence package while she could.

She put on paper many of the policies we're moaning about today........she's just not taking the heat for it.

[slidekellyslide]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

Donahue was groomed by Whitman to be doing exactly what he is right now. "Glory Days" just means she was in charge when the stock went public and she could get out with a multi-hundred million $ severence package while she could.

She put on paper many of the policies we're moaning about today........she's just not taking the heat for it.

So does Donahue have some spectacular golden parachute? He sure seems intent on destroying a once great company.

[FrankWakefield]

My apologies to the lady, then. California needs her. eBay needs her back!! Maybe she could save both with a joint venture.

[scgaynor]

I think that Meg tried alot of things when in charge. A number of them were positive and worked to make ebay a great place to sell but it is also true that she set in motion some ideas that have not worked for ebay. The question is would Meg have stuck with those ideas when it was clear they were not working, or would she continue with them like the current CEO. Impossible to tell, but I think that she had far more business sense and didn't completely rely on focus groups and consultants that don't anything about selling on ebay like the current brass. Can anybody think of one good decision that was made after Meg left?

In my opinion, what is killing ebay is how they treat sellers. When Meg was in charge, the philosophy was that all sellers were equal, it didn't matter if you were Walmart or a single mom working out of your basement. Every seller had the same opportunity to make a buck. They didn't play with the search standings, offer discounts to volume sellers, and put all of the power into the hands of the buyer.

It just seems that when Meg was in charge, ebay was a leader, now they are just trying to play catch-up. Their problems are self inflicted. What they should do is offer "Ebay Classic" as a separate platform that is only auctions with none of the annoying aspects of current ebay. Turn back the clock to 2004 and put those policies back into place. In bad economic times Ebay should be thriving, not dying.

Scott

[FrankWakefield]

What Scott just said so well....