Note: This post was originally posted on February 19, 2010. A lot may have changed since then…
Funny coincidences happen all the time, and it just so happens that one of them reminded me that Kara Swisher needed to be on The A-List.
I was watching CNN or BBC World News from my hotel room in Paris after the first day of the LeWeb conference. Lo and behold, I heard for the first time that AOL and Time Warner had split – big news in the Internet world. It was the first I’d heard of it after a full day at an Internet conference, so I couldn’t wait to get the details.
They told the basic story, then went to the prominent expert on the topic of the merger and uncomfortable pairing, authoring two books on the topic.
That expert? Kara Swisher.
As you probably know, Kara Swisher is Co-Executive Editor of AllThingsD and has followed the space for the better part of her distinguished career. Listen to the archive:
Bio
Kara Swisher started covering digital issues for The Wall Street Journal’s San Francisco bureau in 1997. Her column BoomTown originally appeared on the front page of the Marketplace section and also online at WSJ.com.
Previously, Ms. Swisher covered breaking news about the Web’s major players and Internet policy issues and also wrote feature articles on technology for the paper. She has also written a weekly column for the Personal Journal on home gadget issues called Home Economics.
With Walt Mossberg, she currently co-produces and co-hosts D: All Things Digital, a major high-tech conference with interviewees such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and many other leading players in the tech and media industries. The gathering is considered one of the leading conferences focused on the convergence of tech and media industries.
Previously, Ms. Swisher worked as a reporter at the Washington Post. She is also the author of “aol.com: How Steve Case Beat Bill Gates, Nailed the Netheads and Made Millions in the War for the Web,” published by Times Business Books in July 1998. The sequel, “There Must Be a Pony in Here Somewhere: The AOL Time Warner Debacle and the Quest for a Digital Future,” was published in the fall of 2003 by Crown Business Books.
She is a graduate of Georgetown University and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
