The chief digital officer of NBC News, Vivian Schiller, is joining Twitter to lead the company's news partnership efforts, Twitter announced on Thursday. As Twitter approaches its IPO, the company will need to show investors how it can become profitable in the future, and it seems like an effort to focus on partnerships with major media outlets will be one of the company's bigger pushes. Rumors that Schiller was headed to Twitter started to surface earlier this month.
Schiller has a long tenure in the news space. She's the former president and CEO of National Public Radio (NPR) but also spent time at Reader's Digest and The New York Times. Her LinkedIn profile hasn't yet been updated to reflect her new position, though she served in her current role at NBC for about two years and four months.
We're thrilled to announce @VivianSchiller is joining the team as Twitter's new Head of News Partnerships. She starts in January!
— Twitter for News (@TwitterForNews) October 24, 2013
Twitter has been indirectly testing its own news service through an account under the name Parrot. The account sends breaking news through direct messages, and could be used in the future as some form of subscription service — though that's purely speculation. Twitter also recently poached iTunes Radio exec Gareth Paul from Apple. Paul will work on ad partnership deals for Twitter.
