Peter Kafka Leaves SAI to Join Kara & Walt at All Things Digital

By Kyle Austin

September 18th, 2008

By Kyle Austin

Rupert Murdoch’s Dow Jones digital unit (AKA: Kara Swisher, Walt Mossberg & All Things Digital) got their New York beachhead in prying away Peter Kafka from the Silicon Alley Insider and Henry Blodget yesterday afternoon. Blodget broke the news with a post yesterday evening which tongue-in-cheek’ly implied that Walt and Kara had stolen his former managing editor.

Kara, in a post a few hours later, confirmed his story by noting that Peter has always been her and Walt’s top choice for a new East Coast voice. Kafka will leverage his relationships in the advertising and media world, which he built during his ten years at Forbes, to pen a ”Yet to be Named” media column for the online publication.

The move by Kara and Walt is very similar to the move Michael Arrington made last September in naming Erick Schonfeld the Co-Editor of TechCrunch. Schonfeld was hired with the intention of him staying in New York and building out the blog’s national appeal by adding an East Coast voice.  Look for Kafka to do much of the same for All Things Digital, which is a good thing for East Coast companies looking to get on their radar screen.

New York City has become a vibrant scene for technology start-ups; especially for those in the media, marketing and advertising industries. Although Wall Street may be imploding, it doesn’t mean that the financial backers for these companies are going anywhere. One can look no further then Fred Wilson and Union Square Ventures to know that this start-up scene will continue to thrive; which is a nice consolation prize for Henry in loosing Peter - and more good news for Kara and Walt.

Entry Filed under: Digital Media Relations,VCs & M&A,Web 2.0