# Vox Media **Vox Media** is the digital publisher founded in 2005 (as SB Nation, by Jim Bankoff and Tyler Bleszinski) that grew by 2015 into the model "new media" company — Vox.com's explainer journalism, The Verge, Polygon, Eater, Curbed, New York Magazine (acquired 2019) and the Vox Media Podcast Network (*Pivot*, *Today, Explained*, *Decoder*) — and that in 2026 was broken in two. On May 20, 2026 [[James Murdoch]]'s [[Lupa Systems]] agreed to buy three of its divisions — [[New York Magazine]], the podcast network and Vox.com — in a package reported above $300 million; the deal closed **July 8, 2026**, with the acquired properties operating as a Lupa subsidiary under the Vox Media name and Bankoff as its CEO. The Verge, SB Nation, Polygon and the rest stayed behind. See [[James Murdoch Lupa NY Mag Vox Acquisition]]. ## Why it is in the vault Vox Media is the counter-pole to the vault's main media story. The Fox / [[News Corporation]] axis under [[Lachlan Murdoch]] is the capture case; Vox under James Murdoch — the brother who left the family company in 2020 over its editorial direction and has since funded The Atlantic-adjacent and pro-democracy ventures — is the test of whether a Murdoch fortune can own a liberal newsroom without changing it. The properties matter individually: *Pivot* made Kara Swisher the most audible critic of [[Elon Musk]] and the Silicon Valley right; Vox.com built the explainer form that the right's media (the Daily Wire, [[The Free Press]]) then adopted; New York Magazine's Intelligencer is the establishment liberal read on the movement this vault documents. The pattern of [[Media Capture]] the vault tracks does not require a hostile owner — which is exactly why a friendly one is worth watching. ## See Also - [[James Murdoch Lupa NY Mag Vox Acquisition]] · [[Lupa Systems]] · [[James Murdoch]] · [[New York Magazine]] - [[Lachlan Murdoch]] · [[News Corporation]] · [[Media Capture]] · [[The Free Press]] · [[Elon Musk]]