Lydia Polgreen was named editor in chief at The Huffington Post. She will succeed Arianna Huffington who left her post this summer.?
Previously, Polgreen served as associate masthead editor at The New York Times and editorial director at NYT Global. Her tenure at the Times lasted for 15 years during which time she held the positions of West Africa bureau chief, South Asia bureau chief and Johannesburg bureau chief. As the latter, she covered the death of Nelson Mandela. ?
In an online article, Polygreen, 41, reportedly said of her new position, ?I feel like we?re living in a moment right now where media has to fundamentally rethink its position vis-a-vis power,? she said. ?I think that the election of Donald Trump and the basic difficulty that the media had in anticipating it tells us something really profound about the echo chamber in which we live, the ways in which journalism has failed to reach beyond its own inner limits.?
Jared Grusd, Huff Post?s CEO, said, ?What I saw in Lydia very uniquely is somebody who is mission-driven, somebody who believes in values,? he said, ?and very specifically, the deep authentic values of journalism and the role of journalism in today?s marketplace.?
Dubbed a “rising star” when she was at the Times, she became known in media circles as “one of Twitter?s most prolific commentators on the state of the media in the digital age.”
