Twitter has confirmed that entertainment industry heavyweight and investor Peter Chernin has joined its board, following up on speculation that the appointment was all set to be made.
Company CEO Dick Costolo revealed that Chernin, a former executive at News Corp who helped launch entertainment service Hulu, has joined the board – his note came via Twitter, of course.
Excited to have @peterchernin join the Peter voting bloc on our board of directors. Cc @peterfenton @plscurrie
— dick costolo (@dickc) November 16, 2012
Chernin himself also got into the spirit of the occasion with his first tweet, although he claims to be a long-time user, strictly in the name of news consumption thus far, he says.
@twitter I’ve been a long-time user of twitter for news and information.Happy to be joining board of this very exciting company.
— Peter Chernin (@PeterChernin) November 16, 2012
Earlier in the day (US time), All Things D reported that an announcement would be forthcoming and the significant move has indeed taken place.
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The addition of Chernin, who holds a seat on the board of US Web radio service Pandora, is a logical fit for the microblogging service that is continuing its move into the entertainment and media segment.
This year has seen Twitter undergo a visible shift from a purely-communications focused channel to a multimedia platform rich with images and content. The introduction of Twitter’s Cards — preview of multimedia that show up alongside the 140 characters of text — best reflects this direction and the ‘expandable tweets’, as TNW’s Matthew Panzarino describes them, took a further step mainstream when they arrived on the search and discover sections of Twitter’s mobile apps earlier today.
The new focus is intrinsically tied to advertising since Cards, which are used by more than 2,000 brands, include space for advertising and gender targeting for promoted products. The addition of Chernin’s know-how and experience is sure to help Twitter fine-tune and focus its approach as it continues to develop the strategy that is making it money – a question that had remained unclear for some while.
Twitter lost one board member when Flipboard founder and CEO Mike McCue stepped down around August. McCue, who was said to have left due to Twitter’s increasingly rivalry with the social reader service, never went public on the reasons behind his exit, but he did warn the company that it a change of direction could impact its success.
“You have to be really careful not to let money get in the way,” McCue said in an interview with The Telegraph.
Image via Scott Olson/AFP/Getty Images
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