http://www.beet.tv/2008/10/william-randolp.html
Blaise Zerega, the veteran magazine editor who left Conde Nast's Portfolio earlier this month, has joined FORA.tv as President and COO, William Randolph Hearst III, lead investor and vice chairman of the board announced today.
In a statement, he said:
“Blaise is a proven executive with a wealth of experience in both traditional ad-based media and online. His energy, strategic plan, contacts and vision will add more dimensions to FORA.tv's already exceptional experience. Stay tuned for rapid innovation with Blaise.”
FORA.tv is a video aggregation site that hosts videos of conference and speeches of academic, think tank and other authoritative sources, a sort of a wonkish YouTube. The site had a great scoop a few days ago with Alan Greenspan's speech at Georgetown Law School.
The San Francisco-based company was launched in 2006 by Brian Gruber, Chairman and CEO. The company has raised $4 million from Will Hearst and Adobe Systems.
I am pleased to say that Blaise is good friend of mine and Kent. We've known him for 10 years since our PR firm represented Red Herring where he was and then later at Wired, where he held the post of managing editor. Congratulations and all the best to Blaise, Brian and Will on this exciting development.
I had lunch with Blaise at Michael's in Manhattan in January. We had a good chat about the changing landscape of digital media. I have reposted the video today.
News of Blaise's new gig was first reported by Owen Thomas, editor of Valleywag, also a former Red Herring staffer.
Andy Plesser, Executive Producer