Woot founder resigns from Amazon

Woot founder and CEO Matt Rutledge resigned today from Amazon, saying that he didn't fit in at the giant online retailer, which bought his daily deal site two years ago.

Rutledge launched the Texas-based Woot.com in 2004, selling just one item per day until it sold out. The items that were sold were mainly tech-related, including computers, digital cameras, and various toys. The company later expanded into other areas, including wine, user-designed T-shirts, and products for children.

Rutledge said his goodbye to the Woot team in the honest, witty manner that the site as become known for:

Through your hard work and inspiration (or at least suppression of your better judgment), we created one of the most refreshingly unique companies in the world; the most reluctant retailer possible--pitching as few items as we could with the least amount of hype for the least amount of time. We were idealistic and irreverent, and no retailer was more principled or transparent than us. Even in the worst of times, like when we found ourselves commercially viable, we fought the good fight and retained the honor and contrarian upside in our brand, our community, and even our dead-horse-beaten bags of crap.

Rutledge, who wrote that he was leaving "to move on to future projects with fewer acronyms," told TechCrunch that he wasn't fitting into the large retail corporation and looking back, would have liked keeping Woot independent.