Jonathan Miller, the former CEO of AOL, is taking over the digital assets of News Corp., we’ve confirmed independently – his new title will be CEO of Digital Media. This will include Fox Interactive Media and other duties. Peter Levinsohn, the current president of Fox Interactive, will be leaving his current position but will remain at News Corp.
This is more than a little ironic. Miller currently works with Ross Levinsohn at Velocity Interactive Group – and Ross Levinsohn was the head of Fox Interactive before Peter Levinsohn took the position in late 2006.
This means Miller is now running MySpace and other News Corp. digital assets, making him MySpace CEO Chris DeWolfe’s fifth boss in the last few years.
Miller was under contractual obligations with AOL not to work with AOL competitors until this month. Time Warner vetoed his appointment to the Yahoo board of directors last year under the agreement.
We and others have been speculating for weeks that Peter Levinsohn would soon be replaced (particularly since his champion, Peter Chernin, recently announced his own departure) along with a possible reorganization of FIM. Levinsohn is definitely out. What isn’t clear is how the division is being reorganized, but the job will almost certainly be bigger than running the existing FIM assets. Stay tuned.