Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert Iger received $2 million salary and a $13.9 million bonus for fiscal 2008, and his overall compensation was up nearly 11% from 2007...

...Mr. Iger's total compensation for 2008 was valued at $30.6 million, which was up from the year before, when his total compensation was valued around $27.7 million.

If you are wondering where the other 14 or so million on top of his salary and bonus came from (in order to get total compensation of $30 million for the year), $7.7 million is in stock awards, $6 million is in stock option and nearly $800,000 was for travel and security. Now this may seem like a lot, but as the article's author Peter Sanders notes:

Shares of Burbank, Calif.,-based Disney, which have fared better than their peers in the media space, were up 10 cents to close at $21.46 in composite trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Friday.

What does "fared better than their peers" mean, you might wonder? Disney shares lost more than 20% of their value in 2008. However, only an 11% increase in CEO compensation in a year when the company loses a fifth of its market capitalization is a favor to shareholders because:

This year's bonus was $2.4 million less than he was entitled to; the company said Mr. Iger decided to forgo that money as a gesture of goodwill.