Each year I Want Media offers those interested its “The Future of Media” talk, and this year’s lineup includes some heavy hitters. Panelists include Mark Thompson, CEO of The New York Times; Henry Blodget, CEO and editor of Business Insider; Cindy Jeffers, CEO and CTO of Salon Media; Jonah Peretti, CEO and founder of BuzzFeed; and Roy Sekoff, president of HuffPost Live.

If an hour-long discussion on “How the Internet and other digital media are transforming the traditional media landscape” gets you all hot and bothered (don’t be ashamed, there are no judgements here), you’re probably going to want to attend.

For more info, click through.

BuzzFeed just keeps getting bigger. In the past year, there have been multiple big name hirings, verticals launched and partnerships formed. Now, thanks to a $19.3 million Series D funding round, BuzzFeed has room to grow even more. The funding was led by New Enterprise Associates, a venture capital firm.

Jon Steinberg, BuzzFeed’s president and COO, said the funding will allow the company to meet its goals.”We are laser focused on building a media company from the ground up for a world where social is the dominant way people discover and engage with all forms of media,” said Steinberg, in a statement. “That means reimagining and reinventing editorial, advertising, and publishing technology.”

For more on BuzzFeed’s expansion, check out Mediabistro’s Media Beat segment with Jonah Peretti, the site’s founder and CEO.

It’s awards season! Get excited. Unless you don’t ever win awards, then just listen to your favorite Jewel record and curl into a ball until you feel better. Anyway, here’s one award among many: Jonah Peretti, co-founder and CEO of BuzzFeed, has been named I Want Media’s 2012 Person of The Year.

Peretti was the clear favorite among I Want Media’s readers, grabbing 39 percent of the vote. He beat out Nate Silver, Tina Brown and Anderson Cooper. According to I Want Media, Peretti deserved to win:

Peretti and his BuzzFeed team attracted much press coverage in 2012, as they aspired to create a new model for Internet journalism. Peretti, a co-founder of the Huffington Post, described his site’s model as social publishing — one that mined the growing number of people sharing news and other content on sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Best known for viral fluff like ’50 photos of cat heaven,’ BuzzFeed this year made moves into serious reporting and took an ambitious plunge into longform journalism.

BuzzFeed has named Jeff Greenspan its new chief creative officer. Greenspan was most recently communication designer at Facebook. He had been with the social network since last year. Prior to that Greenspan worked as a creative director for BBDO New York.

“Agencies have been making creative for 100 years that targets individuals, but the social web requires ad creative to be re-envisioned for sharing among groups,” said Jonah Peretti, founder and CEO of BuzzFeed. “Jeff is the perfect leader to work closely with a small group of leading brands to push advertising creative into the social age.”

“BuzzFeed is a rare technology and publishing platform that recognizes the importance of great creative in social advertising,” added Greenspan, in a statement. “I’m excited about innovating on the company’s current ad products and creating big ideas that can act as a new kind of ad creative.”

In the final part of our three-part “Media Beat” interview with Jonah Peretti, the internet entrepreneur talks about launching The Huffington Post and BuzzFeed.

“I wasn’t sure if it would be a big success,” Peretti admits, remembering the days leading up to the launch of The Huffington Post. “A friend of mine asked me if he should invest, and I was like ‘I’m not sure’… I didn’t really want to risk my friend’s money.”

He also offers advice for those wanting to launch their own startup, explaining that entrepreneurs shouldn’t worry about what tech blogs are covering.

Part 1: BuzzFeed’s Jonah Peretti: ‘Our Reporters Are Doing the Kind of Work Reporters Love to Do’

Part 2: Jonah Peretti On What It Means To Go Viral

For more videos, check out our YouTube channel and follow us on Twitter: @mediabistroTV

In the first part of our three-part “Media Beat” interview with Jonah Peretti, the BuzzFeed co-founder discusses how his company is becoming a full-scale news organization following a flurry of recent hires and breaks down how social media drives news online.

“We have reporters who have beats and sources, and can do original work,” Peretti says, “the kind of work that reporters love to do, where they dig in on a story. They’re not just aggregating, they’re not summarizing what’s happening elsewhere, they’re creating something new and original.”

For more videos, check out our YouTube channel and follow us on Twitter: @mediabistroTV

It’s been a pretty wild winter at Michael’s. Far from suffering from the seasonal doldrums, the place has been operating on full tilt every Wednesday with a fresh array of A-listers that always make for some pretty good people watching. Today was no exception.

Besides the jam packed dining room filled with boldface names, Peggy Siegal was hosting a party for Ewan McGregor and Emily Blunt to celebrate the release of their latest picture, Salmon Fishing in the Yemen. I caught up with Emily (I loved her scene-stealing turn with Anne Hathaway in The Devil Wears Prada) when we both stopped by Katie Couric‘s table to say hello. “It is a bit unusual,” Emily said when I asked her about the movie’s quirky title. “I’m hoping that it will make people want to check it out and see what it’s really all about. It’s really a lovely love story.” I saw the trailer, I told her, and it does look pretty romantic. “It is! I hope people will like it.” Emily has been making the rounds to promote the film and has a funny Q&A in this week’s New York magazine where she talks about she and her husband, John Krasinski (the cute guy on The Office) being neighbors with Jimmy Kimmel. Everyone, it seems, loves her hubby including Katie. “He’s just so adorable,” Katie told Emily, who could hardly disagree.

I was joined today by Bravo’s newest reality star, matchmaker Lori Zaslow, whose show Love Broker premiered this week, Bravo’s SVP of Communications Jennifer Geisser, and communications manager Ryan McCormick. I caught Lori’s first show and her Monday night appearance on Watch What Happens Live! A new Bravolebrity is born!

The White Plains native and former executive recruiter started her matchmaking business, Project Soulmate, in 2009 with childhood friend Jennifer Zucher and wasn’t looking for TV fame when Bravo came calling. Andy Cohen loved her “big personality” and was determined to get her on-air. ”Bravo loves the love space,” Lori told me. After an eight-month courtship, she finally relented and agreed to do the show. The series was shot in eight weeks last summer. Lori admitted being a little nervous about seeing the finished product. Based on  the first episode, it seems she had nothing to worry about. In the days since the premiere, she’s been deluged with calls from folks looking to make a love connection, including plenty of mothers looking to find mates for their sons. Says Lori, “I realize just how good this could be for our business.” Yup.

The married Manhattan mother of two told me that she’s always been a “natural connector” matching friends, family and strangers with potential mates, ‘Mommy’ friends, nannies and even housekeepers. But she’s clearly most passionate about helping people find love. “No one can’t live without love. It’s scientifically proven that married men live 10 years longer than single men,” she says. “Why isn’t love put first in people’s lives? Today people are working so hard on their lives and careers, but they don’t make time for love. It’s all about striking the right balance.” Lori works exclusively with New York clients, so I asked her why it’s so hard to find the right person in Manhattan. “It’s so easy to meet people here, but it’s really hard to connect,” she explained. “There are too many distractions.” That’s where she comes in. Most of her clients (“98 percent”) are men, and she needs “20 times the amount of women” in order to find the right mate for those looking for love. How does she do it? ”I’m fearless when it comes to love,” she says.  ”I will always go up to anyone who looks interesting and ask, ‘Are you single?’ Most people are flattered. Who wouldn’t want to meet someone great if they’re looking?”

Lori says that there is no bad place to meet “your soul mate” —  it’s just a matter of being open to the experience. The gym, Whole Foods on Sunday nights when most men do their shopping, and even jury duty are fertile ground. Just don’t go looking in places where you wouldn’t ordinarily go. ”Don’t join a runners’ club if you hate running,” she advises. “Like goes to like. Be who you are. Enjoy yourself and enjoy your life.”

Here’s a rundown on today’s crowd:

1. HollywoodLife.com editor in chief Bonnie Fuller and PMC vice chairman Gerry Byrne. In attendance: BuzzFeed founder Jonah Peretti, Ann Lawlor, The Weinstein Company’s Meryl Poster, fashionista Fern Mallis, Mesa Global’s Mark Patricof, style expert Jill Martin, AdWeek‘s Lisa Granatstein and HollywoodLife.com publisher Carlos Lamadrid.

2. Terry McDonnell and CBS News This Morning‘s Gayle King

3. ‘Mayor’ Joe Armstrong, who was brandishing a cane. A little birdie told me the mayor was hobbled by too much bronco busting. Be careful out there!

4. Wowowow.com’s Joni Evans and Liz Smith. Great to see you!

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BuzzFeed founder Jonah Peretti was in our mediabistroTV studio today for an upcoming Media Beat interview and he shared his thoughts on Andrew Breitbart, who died Thursday morning. Peretti worked with Breitbart in launching The Huffington Post.

“It’s easy for internet commenters to say, you now, ‘It’s good he’s dead and look at all the damage he’s done,’” Peretti said. “But it’s harder when you’ve met someone to feel that way.”

For more videos, check out our YouTube channel and follow mbTV on Twitter: @mediabistroTV

BuzzFeed keeps growing. After making a statement by appointing Politico’s Ben Smith as editor-in-chief, TechCrunch reports that the news aggregator raised $15.5 million in financing from New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Lerer Ventures, Hearst Media, Softbank and RRE Capital.

It’s also beefing up its board by adding Patrick Kerins, general partner at NEA, bringing on former Huffington Post president Greg Coleman as an adviser and promoting Ken Lerer, co-founder of Huffington Post, to executive chairman.

Regarding the site’s direction, BuzzFeed founder Jonah Peretti told TechCrunch, “The biggest shift for us is refocusing under Ben [Smith] as an organization that does real reporting and original content.”

Buzzfeed has expanded once again, this time adding Ben Smith, veteran of Politco, as its new Editor-in-Chief. Smith will continue to contribute for Politico on a weekly basis, but his main duties will be guiding original content and helping Buzzfeed become a social media news entity once the new year begins.

At Buzzfeed, Smith will be hiring reporters who will create original content and break news specifically formatted for the social web. This movement began last week, when Buzzfeed hired two from Gawker Media. We expect that future hires will all be web-specific journalists as well.

Smith said that Buzzfeed is a natural spot for him. “Social media is what moves a story,” explained Smith. “It has become the primary way people, from plugged-in insiders to casual readers, get their news. BuzzFeed is the best in the world at distributing content on social sites, and it is a tremendous opportunity to join BuzzFeed — and its millions of readers — to build a new model for high-quality reporting.”

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