 Preet Bharara |
Preet Bharara, former US Attorney for the Southern District of New York was hired as a senior legal analyst by CNN. The network also brought on Walter Shaub Jr., who resigned as director of the Office of Government Ethics in July, as a contributor. Since leaving office, Bharara has been active on a number of fronts. In addition to scoring a million-dollar book deal with Alfred A. Knopf and being named a “distinguished scholar in residence” by the NYU School of Law, he has amassed 400,000 Twitter followers and debuted a podcast, “Stay Tuned with Preet.” The first episode of that podcast, “That Time President Trump Fired Me,” tells the story of his dismissal.
 |
While “Megyn Kelly Today” might be the high-profile new entry in the morning news arena next week, it has some company: news and entertainment site BuzzFeed. Starting September 25, “AM to DM” will be running daily at 10 a.m. on Twitter’s BuzzFeed News channel. Hosted by BuzzFeed books editor Isaac Fitzgerald and executive editor for culture Saeed Jones, the show’s commercial format will resemble that of network television, though the number of ads running will be limited to four two-minute breaks. However, the show will also include the kind of viewer interaction that one would expect from its home on Twitter. The hosts will respond to viewer comments and will feature what they are referring to as “Fire Tweets,” some of the best Tweets of the day.
 Evan Langweiler |
Evan Langweiler, who started his career at NBC Universal as a page handling "Saturday Night Live," has risen through the ranks to become senior vice president, global communications, Universal Filmed Entertainment Group. He moves to the post from the position of VP of global communications for Universal. In his new role, Langweiler will continue to oversee the studio’s strategic media relations plans, worldwide box office reporting, transactional announcements and picture release dates, while serving as the group’s primary staff writer. "Evan works closely with many of our filmmakers, has deep relationships with media and is well respected both internally and externally," said NBC Universal's exec vp global communications and corporate affairs Cindy Gardner.
 |
Hyperlocal news platform Patch saw a spike in traffic during both Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma. Six thousand people read Patch's live updates of the storm, and its stories were shared more than 500 times on Facebook. The Patch newsletter also saw a surge in readership – the Florida edition added over 18,000 subscribers in just four days and in Texas, the newsletter had 3,000 new subscribers over the same period. “We were in a prime position to cover up-to-the-minute localized news including where to find gas, updates on power outages and open shelters,” said Patch CEO Warren St. John. The platform was owned by AOL before turnaround specialist Hale Global purchased a majority stake in the company in 2014.
WNET, the nation’s largest public media company, names Edward O’Keefe its next president and CEO, effective September 21. O’Keefe succeeds Neal Shapiro, who becomes president emeritus and will retire at the end of the year... The Stealth Bot Prohibition Act, which would empower news publishers and other content providers to defend themselves by mandating transparency for all bots crawling their sites, in introduced in the House by Rep. Laurel Lee (R-FL) and Rep. Valerie Foushee (D-NC)... Google gets socked by European Union regulators with a $1 billion fine for using the platform’s dominance as a search engine to illegally undercut competition.
Boston Globe Media acquires InstaTrac, a company that provides subscription-based services aimed at making government information easier to find, track, and understand... AARP names former New Republic CEO and publisher Michael Caruso as its SVP and chief content officer, unifying the organization's portfolio of media, live events and digital platforms... The Fund for American Studies, an educational nonprofit, awards its inaugural Journalism Excellence Fellowships.
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.
