Mike Isaac

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Twitter Poised to Name Media Mogul Peter Chernin to Board of Directors

Twitter is poised to announce the appointment of Hollywood media exec Peter Chernin to the company’s board of directors, according to sources familiar with the situation.

As AllThingsD has previously reported, the microblogging service has been interviewing a series of media executives, including Chernin, for a possible board position with the company.

The media mogul has held key roles at News Corp. (AllThingsD’s parent company), and was a major player in the formation of streaming video service Hulu. Chernin also holds a seat on the board of Pandora, the online music service.

So, naturally, as Twitter has moved increasingly toward a more consumption-based, media-centric company, Chernin is an easy choice for a board seat.

Over the past two years, the company has made major strides into more traditional forms of mainstream media turf, making hashtags and its little bird logo a now-ubiquitous part of watching or promoting TV shows and films.

But more than that, Twitter’s ever-expanding sales and monetization teams want a larger slice of the ad dollars — and the eyeballs — that big media companies bring to the table.

Funny enough, Twitter is currently in the midst of its annual global sales conference, where co-founder Jack Dorsey took the stage on Thursday morning to speak about the state of the company.

As it stands, Twitter’s current board is largely tech-centric in its membership, with Valley veterans Dick Costolo, Jack Dorsey and Evan Williams holding seats, along with others like Benchmark Capital’s Peter Fenton, Peter Currie of Currie Capital, and former DoubleClick CEO David Rosenblatt.

Chernin’s appointment also serves to replace former Twitter board member Mike McCue, CEO and co-founder of the popular media-centric start-up Flipboard.

As I reported last month, Twitter’s search for a new board member had also focused heavily on naming a woman candidate, which the company’s all-male board currently lacks. Twitter had already interviewed a number of female candidates, according to sources, though it has not chosen one yet. It is unclear whether Twitter will appoint another member after Chernin.

A Twitter spokesman declined to comment on any new or potential board appointees.

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Just as the atom bomb was the weapon that was supposed to render war obsolete, the Internet seems like capitalism’s ultimate feat of self-destructive genius, an economic doomsday device rendering it impossible for anyone to ever make a profit off anything again. It’s especially hopeless for those whose work is easily digitized and accessed free of charge.

— Author Tim Kreider on not getting paid for one’s work