Cool Boss Marissa Mayer Is Giving New Smartphones to Yahoo Employees

By Doug Barry | September 16, 2012 | 3:30pm

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In her effort to be the cool new Yahoo boss who has pre-cocktail hour cocktails at two and designates the third Wednesday of every month as Cookie Potluck Day, Marissa Mayer recently sent a memo to all full time (and part time!) Yahoo employees in the US informing them Oprah-style that they all get…smartphones!! Not only will employees get to choose from an extensive litany — iPhone 5, Samsung Galaxy S3, HTC One X, HTC EVO 4G LTE, or Nokia Lumia 920 — of possible smartphones, but Yahoo is going to pay for all the data and phone bills that employees incur exploring a universe of free information (looking at cat videos) with their new space phones.

Business Insider’s Nicholas Carlson notes that Yahoo will discontinue its IT support for Blackberry phones because the company has recognized that it’s no longer living in the Dark Ages (Blackberries are for olds and 10th century Viking warriors trying to coordinate raids). The smartphone overhaul is also, Mayer explains in her memo, a way for Yahoo employees to “think and work as the majority of our users do.” This probably translates to “everyone work harder” in boss-speak, but giving out free awesome phones is at least a great way to immediately purchase a beleaguered Yahoo employee’s loyalty…until hologram phones come out and make smartphones look like rocks.