With Yahoo in trouble and the barbarians at the gates in the form of Microsoft, founder Jerry Yang has looked everywhere for help, even going so far as to talk to rivals like News Corp. and Google. But Yahoo's ultimate salvation may come from an unlikely source: its users. 

Yesterday, Yahoo introduced Buzz, a new service that asks the site's users to help compile the most popular articles from around the web. The idea is to place some of those articles on Yahoo's front page in a bid to reinvigorate the site's hub credentials.

At the same time, Yahoo has said it will allow publishers to help it refine and improve search results on the site by opening up its platform.

While Yahoo has been praised for finally adopting a Web 2.0 approach, it's not clear if the changes will come in time to save the company. According to search guru John Battelle, Yahoo's shift to openness is a good thing, but it lacks the "big vision" necessary to right the company's ship.

But whether Yang's strategy for turning Yahoo around is enough may be a moot point as financial and legal forces conspire to close in on the company. Yahoo's decision to reject Microsoft's bid has incited a slew of shareholder lawsuits that could bog down the company. At the same time, Microsoft has a launched a proxy fight to replace Yahoo's board, a move that could put pressure on the company to accept the deal.