Daily Beast CEO Dietrick departs for new opportunity

The following excerpt was sent out from Yahoo via Variety:

Heather Dietrick, CEO of IAC’s Daily Beast, is leaving the news and opinion website at the end of 2023, Variety has learned.

Dietrick has been hired as chief media officer at Outside Interactive, whose 13 editorial brands include Outside Magazine, Backpacker, Ski, Climbing, Yoga Journal, Velo, Pinkbike and Triathlete. She will remain with the Daily Beast through the end of the year as IAC searches for her replacement.

Dietrick joined New York-based Daily Beast in May 2017 from Gizmodo Media Group (formerly Gawker Media). During her tenure at the IAC brand, the site launched its first subscription tier, offering unlimited access and ad-free subscriber newsletters; rolled out ecommerce business Scouted; and bowed the pop-culture vertical Obsessed.

“It is with mixed emotions that I write to share that after six incredible years, I will be moving on from the Daily Beast to become Chief Media Officer at publisher Outside, Inc., where I will combine my passion for media with my love of engaging in the world of the outdoors,” Dietrick wrote in a memo Wednesday to Daily Beast staff about her departure, which was obtained by Variety.

At Outside, based in Boulder, Colo., Dietrick will oversee all operations and 150-plus staff at Outside’s media brands, reporting to CEO Robin Thurston.

She previously was president and general counsel of Gawker Media, which in 2016 filed for bankruptcy after the company lost an invasion-of-privacy lawsuit filed by wrestler Hulk Hogan that was funded by billionaire Peter Thiel.

Before joining Gawker in 2013, Dietrick was a lawyer for Hearst; a law clerk in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York; and an associate at Goodwin Procter, where she practiced trademark and patent litigation and prosecution.