At the risk of beating a dead multi-billion dollar company, let’s talk about that News Corp. split again. The board voted to move the plan forward, and made June 28 the official separation date. The two new companies will be News Corp. (publishing) and 21st Century Fox (movies and TV).

Aside from the official date, the other thing to note is that there’s more information about the boards of each company. Forbes reports that Rupert Murdoch, Lachlan Murdoch and James Murdoch will have seats on both. News Corp.’s board will also feature John Elkann (former Fiat chairman); Ana Paula Pessoa (partner at Brunswick Group, a PR firm); and Masroor Siddiqui (an investor). At 21st Century Fox there’ll be Delphine Arnault (deputy general manager at Christian Dior); Jacques Nasser (former Ford CEO); and Robert Silberman (executive chairman at Strayer Education).

Now, who wants to have a News Corp. Split Party on the 28th? We’re thinking jello shooters and an ice sculpture of Rupert giving a thumbs up. We’re flexible though.

ESPN is making some serious cuts. A source told Deadspin that about 400 staffers are being let go. Some of those being laid off have been told they can stay until the end of the week if they want.

One anonymous ESPN staffer who got the axe had been with the company for almost a decade. That person considered the move “Completely out of the blue.” The staffer added, “I was told it was 10 percent across the board, which would be roughly 400. I was told the reason was they needed to make their profit margin and they chose to do that via layoff of staff.”

We’ve reached out to ESPN for comment, and we’ll update when we hear back.

Update (12:53 pm):
ESPN sent the following statement: ”We are implementing changes across the company to enhance our continued growth while smartly managing costs. While difficult, we are confident that it will make us more competitive, innovative and productive.”

Update (3:00 pm):
An ESPN spokesperson emailed to tell us that they hadn’t cut 400 staffers. When we asked how many were let go, “We’re not getting into particulars but it is fewer than 400″ was all we got back. So there’s that.

Bonnier Corporation is making moves again. The publishing house has purchased nine motorcycle magazines from Source Interlink Media. In case you didn’t even know there were nine motorcycle magazines, included in the deal are Motorcyclist, Sport Rider, Dirt Rider, Motorcycle Cruiser, Hot Bike, Baggers, Super Streetbike, Street Chopper and ATV Rider. 

In addition to this purchase, Bonnier is selling some of its brands to Source Interlink. Sound + Vision, TransWorld SNOWboarding, TransWorld Motocross, TransWorld SKATEboarding, TransWorldSURF, TransWorld RIDEbmx and TransWorld Business are all now part of Source Interlink’s portfolio.

In a memo announcing the buy, Dave Freygang, Bonnier’s CEO, wrote that this would be the last major change for the company. Just last week Bonnier bought and then folded Parenting and Babytalk.

Below is the full note from Freygang.

Read more

Meredith Corporation couldn’t strike a deal with Time Inc., but it had better luck with Bonnier Corporation.

Meredith just announced that it has acquired Parenting and Babytalk magazines — along with their websites — from Bonnier. The magazines will then be folded into Meredith’s Parents and American Baby.

If you’re a Parenting or Babytalk subscriber, get ready for Parents and American Baby to replace them, beginning with September issues. Parenting’s site — parenting.com — will continue to exist, however.

Sadly, as with any merger/folding, people are likely to find themselves out of jobs. We’ll keep you posted about what we hear.

Matthew Winkler, editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News, has issued a mea culpa for those staffers who used their Bloomberg Terminals to spy on Goldman Sachs workers. Winkler explained that the practice of using the Terminals to access log-in information dates back to the beginning of Bloomberg News. ”There was good reason for this, as our reporters used to go to clients in the early days of the company and ask them what topics they wanted to see covered,” wrote Winkler. “Understanding how clients used the terminal was more important then.”

While Winkler didn’t say how many staffers were spying, he did admit that Goldman Sachs was right to confront the company about the Terminal use. “Our reporters should not have access to any data considered proprietary. I am sorry they did. The error is inexcusable.” He added that the function that allowed staffers to monitor Goldman Sachs has now been disabled.

Nothing helps move a bad story forward like bluntly admitting you were wrong and vowing to do better, so this is a smart move by Winkler. As long as no more complaints bubble up, we imagine this apology will go a long way toward ending the discussion.

Goldman Sachs is rightfully upset with Bloomberg LP and some reporters at Bloomberg News. The New York Post reports that execs at the investment firm confronted Bloomberg LP after realizing that Bloomberg News staffers were using Bloomberg Terminals to essentially spy on Goldman Sachs’ activity.

Sources told the Post that Bloomberg News reporters could see when Goldman Sachs workers logged in and what specific information they had accessed. In one case, a reporter asked a Goldman exec if someone had left the firm, because that person hadn’t used the terminal recently.

“You can basically see how many times someone has looked up news stories or if they used their messaging functions,” the “Goldman insider” explained. “It made us think, ‘Well, what else does [Bloomberg] have access to?’”

Once notified of Goldman’s concerns, Bloomberg LP “decided to disable journalist access to this customer relationship information for all clients,” said a spokesperson.

Here’s the logo for 21st Century Fox, which will operate the TV and movie brands of News Corp. once the company splits in two next month.

It’s kind of cool, right? Or should we just hate it automatically? We’re fine with either way.

[h/t: Gawker]

As of right now, we know of four media companies that posted record web traffic numbers last month. This is entirely due to the Boston Marathon bombings. FishbowlNY saw traffic spike too!

See, when big news happens, people want to read about it. So they hop on the information superhighway and cruise for sites. It’s not as sexy as it sounds. Then, after the traffic slows down, media companies want to brag about their traffic, as if they were the only one who saw increases. But they weren’t! Companies can be so silly.

Sometimes web traffic is worth noting; most times it isn’t. Because we’ve been getting flooded with companies boasting about their numbers last month, we created a generic, blanket statement congratulating them. If you’re a media reporter, feel free to copy this and use it.

Hello web reader. Last month, [MEDIA COMPANY] posted record web traffic numbers. [MEDIA COMPANY'S WEBSITE] received [VERY HIGH NUMBER] unique visitors and [ANOTHER VERY HIGH NUMBER] page views, which represented a [VERY HIGH PERCENTAGE HOPEFULLY BUT IT DOESN'T MATTER BECAUSE THIS IS RELATIVE] increase over last April.

[IMPORTANT PERSON AT MEDIA COMPANY] said that the traffic was a result of [SOMETHING VAGUE BUT SORT OF INTERESTING SOUNDING]. “[BORING QUOTE FROM IMPORTANT PERSON THAT NO ONE WILL READ].”

News Corporation just reported its third quarter earnings, and once again, things are looking good for the media behemoth. Well, at least parts of it. For News Corp.’s fiscal third quarter revenue jumped 14 percent to $2.85 billion, but it would have been higher if not for a $45 million loss posted by the company’s publishing brands.

In the end, News Corp. said that about 55 percent of its revenue growth is from entities such as Fox News, 20th Century Fox and FX.

That will make things all the more interesting when the big split happens. The division is expected to take place at the end of June, with 21st Century Fox controlling the movie studio and TV properties and News Corp. controlling The Wall Street Journal, The New York Post and more.

AOL had some positives in its first quarter earnings report. Total revenue for the company was up two percent compared to last year, hitting $538 million. Ad sales were also up nine percent, from $330 million to $359 million.

Those are good signs, but as always, the hilarious highlight of any AOL earnings report is noting that it’s still raking in lots of cash from people using its dial-up service. Though subscription revenue declined nine percent for Q1, those customers who continue to live in 1999 brought the company $165 million.

“AOL’s strategy of being the first scaled media and technology company is clearly represented in our results today, and we will continue to aggressively drive the company toward near-and long-term growth,” said Tim Armstrong, the company’s CEO, in a statement.