“As of Feb 14, 2013, I am ending my tenure as CEO. Roger Simon, the novelist-screenwriter, is calling to me. After more than seven years, he is feeling extremely neglected. I am going to return to my creative writing while I still, to be honest, have some ability to do it.” So says Roger Simon today in a blog post at PJmedia.com
PJ Media (originally “Pajamas Media”) began as an aggregation site featuring a group of bloggers who took great issue with the derisive characterization of bloggers as “guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas” made by then CBS News executive vice-president Jonathan Klein in response to bloggers‘ effective ability to expose gross falsehoods in CBS News anchor Dan Rather’s report on President George Bush’s Texas Air National Guard service.
That was 2004, and Dan Rather is long gone. Klein is spending a lot of time in his pajamas these days, after leaving CBS News for CNN (where he was subsequently fired in 2010). Meanwhile, PJ Media’s growth under Simon’s leadership included the transformation of the site from a blog aggregation page to a fully integrated stand-alone site, as well as the creation of PJTV.com, the first Internet TV network. According to PJ Media, their current traffic is 24 million page views per month.
Simon, a Hollywood screenwriter who became an outspoken conservative after the OJ Simpson trial and the events of September 11, 2001, will return to screenwriting. He will also maintain his presence on PJ Media with a weekly column as well as co-hosting the Poliwood show on PJTV with screenwriter Lionel Chetwynd.