Big Money Takes Over Sun Valley

July 11, 2008— -- The first thing one notices when flying into the tiny Hailey/Sun Valley Airport in Idaho is its disproportionately large hangar full of private and corporate jets. Oh, yes, it's the first sign of big money taking over the little resort town.

It could only mean one thing if private jets outnumber the commercial planes: It's that time of year again for the Allen & Co. conference, one of the most private and highly exclusive meetings among the media business elite. They come in droves -- literally.

Unlike the world economic forum's annual gathering in Davos, Switzerland, the Sun Valley conference prides itself on being a family event. And so the most powerful media executives from across the globe fly in with their spouses and children. There's something nice about seeing Amazon.com's founder Jeff Bezos walking hand-in-hand with his wife, Rachel Ray with her husband, NBC head Jeff Zucker with his kids at a candy store and legendary investor Chris Davis worrying that his daughter may go into a sugar rush any second from eating a massive lollipop.

The event began Tuesday and closes Saturday night. The private venue has made the conference famous for some mega deal-making. It was here, a few years back, that then Disney CEO Michael Eisner and ABC head Bob Iger decided to join forces and merge the two companies.

And so, once again, the industry titans arrived to chat, share stories and catch up with their industry buddies -- or, more accurately, frenemies -- as Yahoo's CEO and man in the hotseat, Jerry Yang, was overheard saying, "Not too many people are your friends."

He, of course, is the one guy reporters are closely following. The buzz leading up to the conference this year was all about the troubled dot.com giant Yang founded years ago. What will he do with this baby? Why won't he sell it to Microsoft? They offered him a hefty premium for the stock, so why isn't he doing what's best for his shareholders?

The drama has only grown, with corporate raider and large Yahoo shareholder Carl Icahn stepping into the mix, threatening to take over the company by proxy. So reporters and industry insiders were eager to see what happened here -- who would Yang turn to for help?