People Inc.

An executive profile in The Wall Street Transcript says Scott KurnitScott KurnitScott Kurnit is an American media and internet entrepreneur who worked at Warner’s Qube interactive cable service, Viacom’s pay-per-view businesses and Prodigy before founding what became About.com in 1996 and serving as its chairman and chief executive; in 2010 he founded AdKeeper, later Keep Holdings.Open the full entry founded the company that became About in June 1996 and served as its chairman and chief executive; CNNCNNCNN (Cable News Network) is an Atlanta-based news organization founded by Ted Turner on June 1, 1980, as the world’s first 24-hour television news channel. It has been owned in turn by Turner Broadcasting System, Time Warner, AT&T and Warner Bros. Discovery, became part of Skydance Corporation along with Warner Bros. Discovery in October 2026, and is one of the five networks that rotate in the White House television pool.Open the full entry dates the founding of The Mining Company to February 1997 and says it became About.com in 1999.⁠[1][2]

CNNfn reported that Primedia had agreed to buy About.com in a stock deal of about $690 million, at 2.3409 Primedia shares per About share; About.com then had almost 21 million unique users and was the seventh most-visited network according to Media Metrix.⁠[2]

The New York Times Company agreed with Primedia in February 2005 to buy About, Inc. for about $410 million and completed the acquisition on March 18, reporting About as a separate segment.⁠[3][4]

In August 2012 The New York Times Company agreed to sell the About Group, comprising About.com, ConsumerSearch and CalorieCount, to IAC for $300 million in cash; IAC described About.com as nearly 1,000 topic sites with about 100 million monthly unique visitors. The sale closed on September 24.⁠[5][6]

About.com was renamed Dotdash, a trade name over its vertical brands Verywell, The Balance, Lifewire, The Spruce, ThoughtCo and TripSavvy. Chief executive Neil VogelNeil VogelNeil Vogel is an American media executive who has run About.com since April 2013, leading its renaming as Dotdash, its acquisition of Meredith to form Dotdash Meredith and its 2025 rebrand as People Inc.; on August 5, 2026 he became chief executive of the parent company, People Incorporated.Open the full entry said the “Dot” nodded to the red dot in About.com’s logo, “a nod to our 20-year history.”⁠[7][8]

Digiday noted that dot-dash is Morse code for the letter A, for About, which Vogel called “a little Easter egg.”⁠[8]

Dotdash completed its acquisition of Meredith Holdings at $42.18 per share in cash, forming Dotdash Meredith with Vogel as chief executive and about 188 million monthly online consumers. IAC’s results show a total price of $2.7 billion, financed with a new credit agreement.⁠[9][10]

IAC said in its second-quarter 2025 results that Dotdash Meredith’s content partnership with OpenAI began in May 2024.⁠[11]

Dotdash Meredith announced it was now People Inc., named after its PEOPLE brand. The announcement said the new logo pays tribute to the original Time Inc. wordmark while a colored dot after “Inc.” recalls the company’s internet history from About.com and Dotdash. Vogel said the old name “wasn’t the most elegant or meaningful” and “could be a law firm or an oil company.”⁠[12]

Digiday reported that the company was drawing a line around 19 of its 40 titles as its growth focus, with the rest continuing to run outside the growth plan, and described the rebrand as formalizing a post-search media strategy.⁠[13]

TechCrunch reported that People Inc. had become a launch partner in MicrosoftMicrosoftMicrosoft is a technology company founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975 and headquartered in Redmond, Washington, with businesses spanning Windows, Microsoft 365, Azure, enterprise software, artificial intelligence, gaming and devices.Open the full entry’s publisher content marketplace, with Copilot as the first buyer, and that Google Search had fallen from 54% of its traffic two years earlier to 24% in the latest quarter.⁠[14]

IAC’s 2025 Form 10-K says People Inc. has more than 40 brands reaching more than 175 million people a month, publishes 18 magazines and about 425 special-interest publications, and has about 15.4 million active subscriptions.⁠[15]

The same filing discloses that Barry DillerBarry DillerBarry Diller is an American media and internet executive who was chairman and chief executive of Paramount Pictures and of Fox, Inc., where he created the Fox network, and later led IAC (renamed People Incorporated in 2026) and Expedia, serving as chairman and senior executive of both.Open the full entry, Diane von Furstenberg and Alexander von Furstenberg hold all 5,789,499 Class B shares, with ten votes each, giving them about 46% of total voting power, and that under a governance agreement Diller has consent rights over certain actions when debt to EBITDA is 4:1 or more.⁠[15]

IAC announced it would rename itself People Incorporated. In his shareholder letter Diller said People Inc. had 40-plus brands and about 3,500 employees, shipped about 250 million magazines a year, and had posted its tenth consecutive quarter of digital growth in the first quarter of 2026.⁠[16]

IAC’s first-quarter results showed People Inc.’s digital revenue up 8% to $253.2 million, while core sessions fell 17%, which the company attributed to Google AI Overviews.⁠[17]

IAC Inc. changed its name to People Incorporated effective 12:01 a.m. Eastern on June 4, 2026, with its Nasdaq ticker changing from IAC to PPLI. On June 30 the publishing unit’s legal entity, Dotdash Meredith Inc., was renamed People Inc. Group.⁠[18][19]

People Incorporated reported second-quarter People Inc. revenue of $416.7 million, down 2%, with digital revenue of $289.9 million, up 6% for an 11th consecutive quarter of growth, while total sessions fell 23%.⁠[20]

People Inc.: Official website: https://www.people.inc/ (opens in a new window)⁠[21]

People Incorporated: Investor relations website: https://ir.people-incorporated.com/ (opens in a new window)⁠[21]