Ed Morrissey Explains the New 'Hot Air'!

At the video, Robert Stacy McCain has a brief interview with Ed Morrissey, and at Hot Air, "Welcome to the New Hot Air!":

What I can tell you is that Salem bought Hot Air because, if you’ll pardon a Sally Field moment here, they like us — they really, really like us. After all, they aren’t going to spend a boatload of cash (and no, I don’t have any idea what kind of boatload that might be) just to turn Hot Air into something completely different. If they wanted something completely different, they could have started something fresh with a lot less cost and competed against us instead.

When we negotiated our new relationships with Salem, both of us stressed the need to have the same editorial control and direction for Hot Air. Not surprisingly, Salem readily agreed. Now, they still own the business and can intervene when they see fit — just as Michelle could, but rarely if ever did — but they know us and our editorial choices. We clarified the process and the direction to our satisfaction. If we weren’t satisfied that we remained in position to maintain the current direction of Hot Air, neither of us would have stuck around. We did, and we’ll be around for a while, too.

That doesn’t mean there won’t be changes, of course, but most of those will be to broaden our impact and reach. Salem has a tremendous presence with its radio hosts, for instance, and it wouldn’t surprise me to see some synergy applied in that direction. Townhall, now our sister site, will remain separate from Hot Air, but we’ll probably have some opportunities to participate more often in the magazine in the future. I’m very excited about the potential for growth at Hot Air by being a part of the Salem family.

But that being said, I’m sad to leave Michelle Malkin’s family after two wonderful years at Hot Air. I don’t think I’m revealing any secrets by telling readers what a caring, sweet, and big-hearted person Michelle is. Working with her and her husband Jesse (who carried the weight of technical and human-resource management like a champ) has been the best professional situation of my life. We both told the Salem execs when we first met with them that they had very large shoes to fill, but as great as they’ve been, it will never be quite the same. Now we get to focus on being friends with the Malkins, and thanks to their many kindnesses over the past two years, we hope that lasts much longer.

RTWT at the link.