Another rat abandons ship.

-- whatzit (boo@hoo.com), September 22, 1999

Answers

Isn't it just amazing the very high number of Ceo's and CIO's bailing out.

-- Paul Milne (fedinfo@halifax.com), September 22, 1999.

Wonder why they're doing that? I can't imagine.

-- cody varian (cody@y2ksurvive.com), September 22, 1999.

Hey, the Secretary of State, Oregon, just bailed. Doesn't have another job. Just up and quit, to many ppl's utter astonishment. He was very popular.

http://www.channel6000.com/news/stories/news-990922-120747.html
Keisling Resigns Secretary Of State Post

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), September 22, 1999.

The Secretary of State quit to pursue jobs in the private sector with the intent to run for Governor in the future. FYI.

Kev

-- Kevin (kevbul@sprynet.com), September 22, 1999.

Isn't the usual story that he quit "to spend more time with his family"?

-- Pearlie Sweetcake (storestuff@home.now), September 22, 1999.

The best example was about 2 months ago, when MICROSOFT's CIO decided to take a 1-year "sabbatical", to return in june 2000. At the time, I realized this was a VERY important turning point.

-- profit_of_doom (doom@helltopay.com), September 22, 1999.

Considering the way many internet IPOs go ballistic in the stock market, perhaps he has an eye on a few hundred million$ worth of stock options.

Jerry

-- Jerry B (skeptic76@erols.com), September 23, 1999.

My spouse knows of a Head-to-head competitor to Amazon.com backed by MSFT. I'll get the name later.

Chuck

(She has the business card, which is terribly cool as it is a business card sized mini CD-Rom.)

-- Chuck, a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), September 23, 1999.

Chuck: They're called 'Digi-Cards' (at least in this neck of the woods). We have them for our business and find they attract lots of attention. They can hold between 6 and 30 MB of data and be used in lots of unique ways. They'll play in nearly any PC's CD ROM drive.

-- Arnie Rimmer (Arnie_Rimmer@usa.net), September 23, 1999.

i have a little friend. we'll call him bob. bob just left his nite shift at the bakery to go to work at the speedy lube. damn that nasty old y2k.

an over toasted kiss.

corri

-- corrine l (corirne@iwaynet.net), September 23, 1999.

I have to agree with Jerry B; tremendous bucks can be made with Internet startups in the right situation.

-- Mori-Nu (silkenet@yahoo.com), September 24, 1999.

Seeing ghosts around every corner perhaps? So someone changes jobs: woooooowheeeeeeeee hey everyone, here's proof the world's gonna end! Hold on: he's moved from a management consultancy company (which do some technology stuff, but not very well) to an "internet company" (which presumably does predominantly technology stuff). Hardly sounds like a rat leaving a sinking ship, more like a rat jumping aboard a bandwagon.

-- J (j@j.j), September 24, 1999.

"Isn't it just amazing the very high number of Ceo's and CIO's bailing out."

I would hardly call this "bailing out." If you think technology is "toast" then this guy has just jumped from the frying pan into the fire.

http://www.redherring.com/insider/1999/0925/cip-headcount.html? id=yahoo

[Excerpted from the above article]

George Shaheen ain't talking. He's probably fit to bust, but he has to keep his mouth shut because Webvan is doing the road show for its highly anticipated IPO.

Mr. Shaheen on Wednesday left his CEO job -- and 30 years of history - - at Andersen Consulting to run the online grocer.

The 55-year-old exec walked away from a job that reportedly paid him more than $3.5 million a year. But that's peanuts compared to what he can make at Webvan.

The company filed documents with the SEC that show it is giving Mr. Shaheen 1.25 million shares of stock and another 15 million options. That's on top of a base salary of $500,000. Pundits say that his stake in the company could add up to $100 million. Any way you cut it, he's going to be stinking rich. At 55, he is positioned for a very comfortable retirement.

Making the move to Webvan apparently wasn't a tough decision for Mr. Shaheen. One insider says that when he and founding CEO Louis Borders met, "they just clicked. It all transpired within a week."

Guess when there's that much moolah on the table, making a quick decision isn't very difficult.

-- Paul Neuhardt (neuhardt@ultranet.com), September 27, 1999.

Louis Borders is co-founder of Borders Bookstores (Borders.com), which he and his bro sold to K-Mart for a great many cheese sandwiches back in 1992. Sounds like he's using some of that cash to make a run at the "online grocery" biz. If it works, he and Mr. Shaheen will probably get bought out by Fred Meyer or whoever, and possess a great many more cheese sandwiches.

Unless, of course, the current rockin' economy takes a hit, sending discretionary income into the tank and making online grocery shopping not so hot a sector.

-- Mac (sneak@lurk.hid), September 27, 1999.