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| Rashida Jones |
MSNBC names Rashida Jones president, effective Feb. 1. Jones, who will be the first Black woman to lead a major cable news network, joined MSNBC as an executive producer in 2013, and is currently senior vice president, overseeing daytime news coverage for the network. She will succeed Phil Griffin, who has been MSNBC president since 2008. “Rashida knows and understands MSNBC, in part because it’s where she started when she first joined NBCU seven years ago,” he said in a memo to employees “She knows that it is the people who work here that make it great, and she understands its culture. She also appreciates the impact and potential of the brand.”
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| Monica Richardson |
The Miami Herald appoints Monica Richardson as executive editor, making her the first Black executive editor in the paper’s 117-year history. Richardson, who comes on board at the Herald on Jan. 1, is currently senior managing editor at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Before coming to the AJC in 2007, she worked at the Charlottesville Observer, Florida Times-Union and Lexington Herald-Leader. In her new position, Richardson will also oversee el Nuevo Herald and the Bradenton Herald, and serve as McClatchy’s Florida regional editor (McClatchy is the Herald’s owner.) “She has a strong record of leadership in local journalism at one of the great metro newsrooms in the country. Now, she brings her commitment to accountability journalism and a track record of successful digital innovation that serves local audiences,” said McClatchy senior vice president of news Kristin Roberts.
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The Hartford Courant is the latest Tribune Publishing newspaper to leave its physical office space behind. On Dec. 27, the paper is vacating the building it has occupied since the mid-1940s. Employees that include the Courant’s advertising staff and reporters have worked from home since March, so the offices have mostly been empty. Other Tribune papers that have closed their newsrooms include the New York Daily News, the Orlando Sentinel, Capital Gazette in Annapolis, MD, and the Morning Call in Allentown, PA.
Trump Media and Technology Group Corp. has replaced CEO and former California Congressman Devin Nunes with Kevin McGurn, a seasoned media sales executive.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is being bought by the Venetoulis Institute for Local Journalism, a nonprofit that is the parent organization of the Baltimore Banner... The British Broadcasting Corporation is axing approximately 2,000 jobs, about 10 percent of its work force... Snap, the company behind Snapchat, is also succumbing to layoff fever, announcing plans to lay off 16 percent of its employees, about 1,000 people.
CBS News Radio will go off the air on May 22, part of the axe-swinging managerial plan put into play by CBS editor-in-chief Bari Weiss... The Economist, which was first published in 1843, is changing hands. Canadian billionaire Stephen Smith has agreed to acquire a 26.9 percent stake in the publication from Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild, her family and family foundation... Nexstar Media Group says it has closed its acquisition of TEGNA, the broadcast, digital media and marketing services company that was formed in 2015, when the Gannett Company split into two publicly traded companies.
USA TODAY brings on Jamie Stockwell as VP of news, effective March 30. Stockwell was most recently deputy managing editor of news for the Washington Post... YouTube expands its likeness detection capabilities to a pilot group of government officials, journalists and political candidates... The AP Fund for Journalism adds 50 news organizations to its local news program, bringing the total number of participating newsrooms to 100. 
Versant Media Group, the NBCUniversal cable TV spin-off, today reported its first financial results as 2025 revenues dipped 5.3 percent to $6.7B and standalone EBITDA dropped 9.1 percent to $2.2B.
