The Daily Beast

The Daily Beast, led by former Vanity Fair and The New Yorker editor Tina Brown, went online in October 2008 with the slogan “Read This Skip That” and a “Cheat Sheet” section rounding up articles from around the web, alongside blog posts, articles and video. Tina Brown described it as “a speedy, smart edit of the Web from the merciless point of view of what interests the editors.”⁠[1]

The site was a business unit of IAC backed by Barry Diller, with its team based at IAC’s headquarters; development began in July 2008. The first phase was a soft launch without advertising, with about 30 percent original content and the rest outbound links and curation; Caroline Marks was general manager. The name comes from the newspaper in Evelyn Waugh’s novel Scoop.⁠[2]

The company’s About page states that The Daily Beast was founded in 2008 as the vision of Tina Brown and IAC Chairman Barry Diller. In a 2018 essay, Tina Brown wrote that she joined forces with Diller’s IAC in 2007 to start an online news site, and that when Diller first asked, her reaction was “no thanks.”⁠[3][4]

On November 12, 2010, Newsweek and IAC’s The Daily Beast announced the merger of their operations into The Newsweek Daily Beast Company, a joint venture owned equally by Sidney Harman and IAC. Harman became executive chairman and Barry Diller a director, with each side appointing one additional director.⁠[5]

Harman had bought Newsweek from the Washington PostThe Washington PostThe Washington Post is an American daily newspaper founded in Washington in 1877, known for its role in the Pentagon Papers case and the Watergate investigation. Run by the Meyer–Graham family for eighty years from 1933, it has been owned personally by Jeff Bezos since 2013.Open the full entry Company in August 2010 for $1. After the merger, Tina Brown served as editor-in-chief of both publications.⁠[6]

The company’s About page in early 2013 stated that The Newsweek/Daily Beast Company LLC was formed in February 2011 and that the combined operation attracted more than 19 million unique online visitors a month.⁠[3]

IAC initially owned 50 percent of the joint venture and later acquired a controlling stake. Newsweek ended its print edition in 2012.⁠[7][8]

In 2013 IAC sold Newsweek to IBT Media, and The Daily Beast separated from Newsweek that August.⁠[7][9]

In September 2013 Tina Brown announced she was leaving The Daily Beast to found Tina Brown Live Media, focused on summits, salons and debates and on expanding the Women in the World summit she had started in 2010. The site continued under IAC, overseen by managing director Deidre Depke and executive editor John Avlon.⁠[8]

In January 2014 John Avlon, who had been acting interim executive editor, was promoted to editor-in-chief, filling the role vacated by Tina Brown; Noah Shachtman, formerly of Foreign Policy and Wired, was hired as executive editor effective February 1. An internal memo said the site had grown 35 percent over the previous year, averaging 13.7 million unique visitors a month as measured by Omniture.⁠[9]

The company’s About page in October 2014 stated that The Daily Beast was based in New York as an operating business of IAC and reached more than 17 million readers per month.⁠[10]

In May 2018 John Avlon left The Daily Beast to join 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 full time as a senior political analyst and anchor, and executive editor Noah Shachtman succeeded him as the site’s third editor-in-chief. Avlon said he had joined as a columnist one month after the 2008 launch, that traffic had more than doubled over the previous five years to over one million readers a day, and that the site had won 17 journalism awards during his tenure.⁠[11]

On July 15, 2021, Noah Shachtman was named editor-in-chief of Rolling Stone, starting that September; executive editor Tracy Connor became interim editor-in-chief of The Daily Beast.⁠[12]

On August 18, 2021, Connor was named editor-in-chief. She had been the site’s executive editor since 2018 and had previously worked at the New York PostNew York PostThe New York Post is a daily newspaper in New York City, published by New York Post Media Group, a News Corp company.Open the full entry, the New York Daily News and NBCNBCNBC (National Broadcasting Company) is an American national commercial broadcast television network. It was founded by RCA in 1926, began as a radio network and later developed television. With ABC and CBS it is one of the three traditional U.S. broadcast networks; it passed to General Electric with RCA in 1986, merged with Universal to form NBCUniversal in 2004, has been controlled by Comcast since 2011, and is one of the five networks that rotate in the White House television pool.Open the full entry News; she planned to expand investigative work and opinion columns.⁠[13]

Barry Diller had sought a buyer or strategic partner for The Daily Beast for more than a year, and a planned joint venture with the Hollywood-focused media company The Ankler fell apart. The site was not profitable at the time and had about 100 employees.⁠[14][15]

Chief executive Heather Dietrick left at the end of 2023 to join Outside Interactive as chief media officer.⁠[7]

On April 15, 2024, IAC announced a strategic partnership with Ben Sherwood and Joanna Coles to lead The Daily Beast: Sherwood became publisher and CEO, effective immediately, and Coles chief creative and content officer, with both sharing a substantial interest in the company; financial terms were not disclosed. Barry Diller said, “These are tough times for digital journalism.”⁠[16]

Sherwood was formerly president of the Disney ABCABCABC (American Broadcasting Company) is an American commercial broadcast television network. It grew out of NBC’s Blue radio network, took its name after becoming independent in 1943, developed into a national television network after merging with United Paramount Theatres in 1953, was acquired by Capital Cities in 1985, and has been owned by The Walt Disney Company since 1996. With CBS and NBC it is one of the three traditional U.S. broadcast networks, and it is one of the five networks that rotate in the White House television pool.Open the full entry Television Group, and Coles was formerly chief content officer of Hearst Magazines. The pair received a 49 percent stake, with IAC remaining majority owner. Coles said she planned to bring the outlet “back to its rebel roots.”⁠[14][17]

In 2024 Tracy Connor stepped down as editor, and Hugh Dougherty, formerly deputy editor of the New York Post and earlier of the Daily Mail, was named to a newly expanded executive editor role, announced in an internal memo from Sherwood and Coles.⁠[18]

The new management ran a voluntary buyout program aimed at cutting $1.5 million in costs, and headcount fell by about 35 percent through buyouts and a handful of layoffs; the site also recruited dozens of new contributors, including Samantha Bee, Tina Brown and Dick Costolo. IAC’s results showed The Daily Beast’s revenue rising 81 percent year over year in the third quarter of 2024, and IAC chief executive Joey Levin said in an internal memo that the site was profitable for the first time that quarter.⁠[17]

In July 2026 the parent company People IncorporatedPeople Inc.People Inc. is an American digital and print publisher, formerly Dotdash Meredith and renamed on July 31, 2025, whose 40-plus brands include PEOPLE, Better Homes & Gardens, Food & Wine, Allrecipes and Investopedia; its parent, formerly IAC, renamed itself People Incorporated (Nasdaq: PPLI) on June 4, 2026.Open the full entry, formerly IAC, was exploring a sale of The Daily Beast as it focused on People Inc. and MGM. The site was by then profitable, with website advertising down to less than a quarter of revenue and the rest coming from podcasts, subscriptions and syndication. Sherwood, Coles and president Keith Bonnici held a minority stake. Representatives of The Daily Beast and People Incorporated did not comment.⁠[15][19]

On its About page, The Daily Beast says it delivers original reporting, analysis and opinion in the arena of politics, pop culture and power, and describes its journalism as “non-partisan but not neutral.” The page says the site is based in New York and majority owned by IAC, with editorial control independent from IAC.⁠[20]

The masthead on the About page lists executive editor Hugh Dougherty, publisher and CEO Ben Sherwood, chief creative and content officer Joanna Coles, global editorial director Nico Hines and Washington bureau chief David Gardner; site sections include Cheat Sheet, Politics, World News, U.S. News, Obsessed, The Looker, Scouted, Podcasts and a crossword, and the operating entity is The Daily Beast Company LLC.⁠[20]