Yahoo Inc. is just talking it seriously. Overhauling the entire company is a must these days and it would include replacing the head. In short, firing CEO Carol Bartz is part of the picture. Not just merely firing her but immediately firing her over the phone. It must have been that urgent.

Bartz just sent a memo to her employees regarding what has happened. “I am very sad to tell you that I’ve just been fired over the phone by Yahoo’s Chairman of the Board. It has been my pleasure to work with all of you and I wish you only the best going forward,” she said.

Yahoo used to dominate the internet world years ago but was then left out by the even stronger and getting bigger Google Inc. In addition to that, Facebook Inc is also present in the picture lessening Yahoo’s market share in selling online graphical and video ads.

The company has enough reasons to erase Bartz in the picture. These would include a 33% drop in the number of minutes that U.S. website visitors spend on Yahoo sites per month and its stock price remained in a flat line.

On Thursday afternoon, foreign student workers flooded the commercial district of Hershey, Pennsylvania—home of the Hershey Story museum and Hersheypark. The foreign students are in the United States legally through the federal J-1 visa, a summer work program that enables students from foreign universities to come to the United States to work. The idea behind the program is to allow students from around the world to experience life in the United States and to learn more about its culture.

The students who worked in a Hershey Co. packaging and distribution warehouse in Palmyra, however, claim that the wages—around $8.35 an hour, most of which ended up paying off their housing costs—were not enough to repay the $3,000 the students shelled out to participate in the program. Many feel that they were exploited.

The J-1 visa was first administered by the U.S. Information Agency to foster better relations between the United States and other countries. Since its purpose was to offer cultural information to students, the program did not fall under the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

Many of the students weren’t informed that they were going to work in a warehouse setting in Pennsylvania, and only found out after they had already arrived in the country. One student said that he had to pay for his trip from Florida—where he was told he had a job waiting for him only to be informed otherwise—to Pennsylvania.

A spokesperson for the Hershey Co. says that the plant is not managed by them, but by a division of German company Deutsche Post DHLA called Exel Logistics. Exel then turned to SHS Onsite Solutions, in Lemoyne, for staffing arrangements. An SHS Onsite spokesperson claimed that they connected with the Council for Educational Travel USA, in California, which recruited at least 370 of the students, and acts as their host. The company is listed as a J-1 sponsor by the U.S. State Department.

The two-day picket rally was organized by the New York-based Guestworker Alliance and even posted videos online containing interviews with the student workers. The students say they just want their money back and for the company to give the jobs to locals who are unemployed. Some of the locals, in turn, have treated them fairly, hoping to give the guests a positive view of American culture. Some commenters in online forums believe that too many American companies are implementing such questionable practices, rather than employing the citizens who live within proximity of these warehouses.

The U.S. State Department stated that it plans to send two senior officials to evaluate the situation.

Groupons are everywhere. Food, travel, cosmetics, recreation and other establishments are running Groupon deals left and right.

So are these establishments getting their money’s worth, meeting their expectations and growing their businesses through these deals?

No information is available regarding repeat business customers so a small survey has been conducted to pulse the small business participants that have actually tried using it once. It appears their motivation to join was driven by curiosity. If that’s the case, Groupon’s market growth can not be sustained with it.

There are 16 confirmed responses from business owners who have offered Groupon deals. Although the number is not a broad sample size, it still offers an insight of how these small companies view the program.

The results in broad strokes:

• Although 60% of the respondents said their trials were successful, more than half do not want to run another deal again.
• 40% reported failure
• Groupon is not necessarily a better strategy compared to its competitors
• Most respondents said “only a handful” became repeat customers
• About half of those surveyed would not recommend Groupon to another small business.

Research In Motion, the Canadian company known for its Blacberry devices, has slashed 11 percent of it workforce translating to 2000 job cuts.

Once the dominant leader in its market, RIM is now left with cost-cutting measures as Apple and Android continue to increase their hold on the mobile market.

But there are doubts about whether cost-cutting alone is enough to see through RIM’s decreased financial performance.

According to Charter Equity Research analyst, Ed Snyder, “The problem is you can’t cut your way into growth or market leadership, and while I’m sure there was fat at RIM, the core problem sits squarely with management.”

Changes on the executive level were also announced. As COO Don Morrison is retiring, the remaining to would assume the additional responsibilites.

“Cost-cutting is unlikely to change the competitive position for the company or accelerate RIM’s revenue growth,” analyst Colin Gillis said.

However, analysts still recognize that cost-cutting is still a necessary step to help the company face its new challenges.

Does the list of worst economies in the world interests you? You might not want to consider living in these countries perhaps.

Last Tuesday, July 5, 2011, Forbes Magazine, released its list of 2011 Top 10 World’s Worst Economies with Madagascar leading the list.

As mentioned in Forbes.com, all 177 countries were ranked according to the average statistics for their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth and inflation for the past 3 years. GDP is s often considered an indicator of a country’s standard of living while inflation refers to the rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time.

Among them, it was Madagascar who went on top with a $448 per-capita gross domestic product which was three times between 1970 and 2009, as revealed by United Nation (UN). Economic mismanagement were one of the reasons why the country got on top of the list.

In case you don’t know where Madagascar is, it is located in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa.

Second to Madagascar is Armenia, the former Soviet Union Republic which has an inflation rate currently running at 7%, with a per-capita GDP of $3,000.

Below are the complete Top 10 Worst Economies as released by Forbes Magazine:

1. Madagascar
2. Armenia
3. Guinea
4. Ukraine
5. Jamaica
6. Venezuela
7. Kyrgyztan
8. Swaziland
9. Nicaragua
10. Iran

On a side note, I wonder why Zimbabwe was not in Top 10. I heard the country having one of the highest inflation rates in the history. Just look at some pictures where everybody is a billionaire.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s arrest over an alleged sexual assault on a maid at Sofitel Hotel in Manhattan has stakeholders people asking of who will take over his vacated position at the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Strauss-Khan was arrested for allegedly forcing a housekeeper at the said hotel to perform sex with him.  The wealthy French politician was arrested and sent to the notorious Rikers Island jail complex.  He however denied any truth to the said allegations.

The allegation coincided with the release of the result of a survey in France that highly favors Strauss-Khan against current French President Nicolas Sarkozy to the voting public.

The name that is picking up steam seen to replace the beleaguered former IMF chief is Zhu Min from China.

Zhu Min is the special adviser of Strauss-Khan.  He worked at the IMF in May 2010 after taking an executive position at the central bank of China.  He has also worked at the World Bank

In a report, another Chinese banker naming Zhou Xiaochuan is floated.

Four Europeans are also considered to be highly-qualified to take the powerful post.  They are Peer Steinbrueck and Axel Weber from Germany, Christine Lagarde from France and Klaus Regling.

Sought for comment about the possibility of working as the chief of IMF, Zhu Min only said,

“I have meetings all day.”

In the history of powerful international financial institutions, Europeans usually head the IMF while American lead the World Bank.

Photo credit: kansas.com

Another acquisition in social media has just happened. Social bookmarking site Delicious was bought from Yahoo! by the founders of YouTube namely, Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, and will now be a part of their internet company named AVOS. This was published as a press release at Delicious’ official blog on Wednesday, April 27, 2011. However, no amount has been declared.

Apparently, Yahoo will operate Delicious until about July 2011 while the transition is going on, in which all users’ information will be transferred to its new owner afterward. As noted by Delicious, they have chosen AVOS to be their new home because they believe Delicious can receive more love and attention, and can move forward as well.

“We’re excited to work with this fantastic community and take Delicious to the next level. We see a tremendous opportunity to simplify the way users save and share content they discover anywhere on the web.” AVOS CEO Chad Hurley said on a blog post.

With that, Delicious users will be asked to allow the site to transfer all the bookmarks, personal account and all associated data, in which a dedicated page was created for it.

By agreeing on the Terms of Service (TOS), Delicious will do the transferring of data which include Delicious username, Delicious password, Email address, full name, bookmarks, among others. For more information, Delicious is inviting all users to visit their Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page.

Photo Credit: Delicious.com

Toyota Recalls Avensis and Lexus IS 250 models in the UK – One of the famous car manufacturers, Toyota, has called in approximately 19,000 cars in the United Kingdom due to the concerns about possible problems with fuel systems.

The company said that hundreds of Toyota Avensis and Lexus IS 250 models could be at risk of fuel leaks and will need to be modified by mechanics. But it also said that there had been no accidents suspected of being related to the defects.

The company’s officials said they were writing to the owners of the affected vehicles to arrange repairs. The move is part of a recall of almost 1.7 million vehicles internationally.

In a statement, Toyota Company said: “As a result of customer feedback in other markets worldwide, Toyota GB today announced it would recall a number of its Toyota Avensis and Lexus IS 250 models in the UK to carry out modifications to their fuel systems. It is working with the Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (Vosa) to contact registered owners and keepers by letter to advise them of the procedure for taking their vehicle to an authorized Toyota or Lexus repairer for the necessary work to be done.”

Almost 15,500 British owners of Toyota Avensis 2.0 Liter and 2.4 Liter petrol engine models which were produced between July 2000 and September 2008, are entitled for the free repair. The repair would take up to four-and-a-half hours.

On the other hand, nearly 3,100 UK-registered Lexus IS 250 petrol engine vehicles which were produced between August 2007 and February 2009, are also affected.

Jon Williams, the managing director of Toyota GB PLC said: “We are committed to putting the customer first and have a total focus on the quality of all products. We will liaise with our customers to carry out the repair procedures as efficiently as possible, with minimal disruption.”

Japan’s transport ministry announced that slight cracks could appear in fuel pipes which may cause leakages if untreated. If the car is continued to be used, the crack may be widened and there may be risks of fuel leakage.

Walmart Fire Forces Evacuation – a Walmart in Brevard County was evacuated on Wednesday morning, after a fire broke out at the McDonald’s restaurant inside the store. The fire started at about 9:20 a.m. at the Walmart at 8500 N. Wickham Road.

According to the reports of Brevard County Fire Rescue, there was a power outage at the store, and McDonald’s employees discovered the fire, which started at the UPS power back-up system being used for the computers, when power was restored.

Employees used fire extinguishers to fight the blaze until fire crews arrived.Fire officials said that the fire was contained to a work area that stored computers and paperwork. Brevard County Fire Rescue crews made use of fans to ventilate smoke from the store, which was evacuated.

The store’s manager said that the store was closed for about an hour. The McDonald’s will remain closed Wednesday for an investigation and clean up.

Representatives from the Florida Division of Hotels and Restaurants were at the scene to assess the damage, which is estimated about $25,000.

Google has won a legal battle over the Android trademark. The judge ruled in favor of Google and the companies using Android OS that were targeted by an infringement lawsuit filed by Erich Specht.

Erich Specht is an entrepreneur from Illinois who was behind a company called Android Data. In 2002, it received trademark protection for the name. However, on the same year, the company folded resulting in the trademark being abandoned.

Specht filed suit against Google seeking $94 million in damages despite his previous company earning only less than a million in revenue before it collapsed.

Google filed a motion to throw out the case and the judge agreed citing that the Android Data trademark has been abandoned. The judge went on to cancel Specht’s trademark to prevent it from causing confusion with Google’s mobile OS.

A Google representative said that the company was “pleased to see the case dismissed as it was baseless from the start.”