JOSHUAJENKINSis unremarkable

There's been a lot of buzz the past couple of days about Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake (best last name ever) resigning from Yahoo. This married pair is responsible for the founding of Flickr, so at least partially to blame for how great Flickr is today. Stewart Butterfield's resignation letter to Yahoo executive Brad Garlinghouse has been circling the tubes.

Friday, June 13th, 2008

Dear Brad,

As you know tin, is in my blood. For generations my family has worked with the most useful of metals. When I joined Yahoo! back in '21, it was a sheet-tin concern of great momentum, growth and innovation. I knew it was the place for me.

Over the decades as the company grew and expanded, first into dyes and punches, into copper, corrugated steel, synthesized rubber, piping, milling equipment, engines, instruments, weaponry, and so on, I still felt at home, because tin was the core of the business.

After the war, as we continued to branch out in electronics, all manner of aeronautical frames, hulls and bodies, computing and tabulating machines, precision controls, and later, farther afield -- real estate, brewing, consumer finance, grain processing, lighting and salty snacks -- I took it in stride, for there was still a place for me.

Since the late 80s, as the general manufacturing, oil exploration & refining, logistics, and hotel & casino divisions rose to prominence, I have felt somewhat sidelined. By the time of the internet revolution and our expansion into Web Sites, I have been cast adrift. I tried to roll with the times, but nary a sheet of tin has rolled of our own production lines in over 30 years!

I don't know what you and the other executives have planned for this company, but I know that my ability to contribute has dwindled to near-nothing, and not entirely because of my advancing age. Therefore, with a heavy heart, I recognize that is time for me to and the company to part ways.

In my 87 years service, I've accomplished many feats, sharing in the ups and downs, made great friends, and learned a tremendous amount (who would have thought that Electronic Mail would come to supplant the nation's own great and venerable post!?) but there is a new generation now and it would be unfair not to give them a chance. Those that started in the make-work programs of the depression, on the GI programs in the late 40s, and even those young baby boomers need their own try, with out us old 'uns standing in the way.

So, please accept my resignation, effective July 12. And I don't need no fancy parties or gold watches (I still have the one from '61 and '76). I will be spending more time with my family, tending to my small but growing alpaca heard and, of course, getting back to working with tin, my first love.

Your old tin-smithing friend and colleague,

-Stewart Butterfield

I took three things from this letter of resignation:

1. Butterfield is not a fan of conglomerates.
2. Butterfield is definitely a fan of the comma.
3. Butterfield wants to get back to working with tin, which, if I'm reading this correctly, is what Flickr was originally built with.

More power to Fake and Butterfield for getting out of an environment they weren't comfortable in. I sincerely hope they're either working on, or about to start working on, some new killer product that will once again set the pace for an entire industry.

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