Marissa Mayer Is Target Of Sexist Rant At Yahoo! Shareholder Meeting From ‘Dirty Old Man,’ George Polis [VIDEO]
Instead of discussing the annual budget and reviewing fiscal information, Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO) CEO Marissa Mayer’s looks were the focus of attention for one investor at the annual Yahoo shareholder meeting on Tuesday.
After the moderator at the meeting asked for questions from the audience, an investor and self-proclaimed “dirty old man” chose to inform the audience that he was more interested in the 38-year-old Mayer than in the company’s stock.
"I'm George Polis,” the man said. "I have 2,000 shares of Yahoo. I'm Greek, and I'm a dirty old man, and you look attractive, Marissa." His comments were captured in a YouTube video, which you can view below, which amassed more than 10,000 views overnight.
Mayer dodged the comment, though. Instead, another Yahoo! executive responded to Polis’ concerns as the attendees at the Santa Clara, Calif., Marriott burst into laughter -- albeit uncomfortable laughter -- over the sexist comment. Eventually, Polis went on to complain about the lack of dividends Yahoo! paid out in past years.
Mayer, who joined Yahoo! as CEO in July, was on the panel for the annual shareholder meeting for the first time since her appointment. Back in November, the former Google exec told Fortune that she’s very keen on a mobile push.
“I think one of the pretty important things for Yahoo’s strategy moving forward is mobile," she said. "This is a huge opportunity for Yahoo, because we have all of the content, we have all of the information people want on their phones, and now it’s about making it easy and relevant to use on mobile.”
The CEO also plans to partner with other companies that offer services that Yahoo doesn't. “One of our employees got up at a Friday afternoon meeting and asked, ‘We don’t have a mobile OS, we don’t have mobile hardware, we don’t have a browser, we don’t have a social network. How are we going to compete?’” she confessed. “And I said, ‘Well we don’t have a mobile OS, we don’t have mobile hardware, we don’t have a social network and we don’t have a browser, which means we can partner with the best people.”
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