12/16/23 - Weekend Listening from Intercontinental Exchange

There was unanimous agreement -- at least in my household -- that Taylor Swift was a fitting selection as TIME’s 2023 Person of the Year.

At the offices of Blackstone (NYSE: BX) at 345 Park Ave., they seemed to concur, at least at the very top. In the company’s annual holiday video, which popped on YouTube on Thursday, firm president Jon Gray calls an “emergency meeting” to propose a Swift-mimicking extravaganza: The Alternatives Era Tour. Buttoned-down colleagues are, of course, dubious, but Blackstone co-founder and CEO Stephen A. Schwarzman declares, definitively, “I love it!” The ball is thus set in motion, reluctantly, courtesy of my friend Christine Anderson , Blackstone’s public affairs chief. It was boffo performance, all around.

In this, TIME’s 100th year, we’ve had our say about the storied media franchise at the NYSE. It began with my Inside the ICE House episode with legendary cover story writer Lance Morrow, author of The Noise of Typewriters. It continued, last week, with NYSE President Lynn Martin hosting TIME to ring our Opening Bell, chronicled by our team at NYSE TV Live, to celebrate the Swift TIME cover triptych. And now it concludes with a new Inside the ICE House episode with TIME CEO Jess Sibley, who herself just completed her first year of leadership under TIME owners Marc and Lynn Benioff (NYSE: CRM).

Now, as we wind down to the end of a tumultuous 2023, perhaps it’s time to unwind by actually reading the POY issue, which is free online, along with all of TIME’s content, thanks to one of Sibley’s executive decisions to remove the magazine’s paywall. Come for editor Sam Jacobs ’ rationale for the Swift selection and Sam Lansky’s interview with Swift, but stay for some of the issue’s companion content, including Sam Altman as TIME’s CEO of the Year, Lionel Messi as Athlete of the Year, Alex Newell as Breakthrough of the Year, and Syd Kitson as Dreamer of the Year.

Kitson, a renowned real estate developer, played four seasons in the NFL with the Packers and Cowboys, but his top Dreamer nod comes from his role as founder of Babcock Ranch. The sustainable, master-planned community in southwest Florida is the first solar-powered town in America. Spanning 143 square miles, it is five times the size of Manhattan, with 18,000 of its acres parceled for hurricane-proof residences and 73,000 acres set aside of perpetual preservation, the largest single land preservation agreement in the state’s history. Similar to a past dreamer, James Rouse (and TIME cover subject from 1981), Syd Kitson dreams big.

I sat with the proud members of the Kitson & Partners team at TIME’s POY Gala Dinner at The Plaza this week. Syd’s well-deserved recognition is part of a branded content program with American Family Insurance, one of Sibley’s many ?revenue-generating initiatives that allows TIME to finance its journalism and remove the paywall for readers. Hear the rest of our conversation with Jessica Sibley in this week’s episode of Inside the ICE House.

The view from TIME: ?

• Swift Transformation: TIME CEO Jess Sibley Unveils the 2023 Person of the Year It seems a perfect ending for Jessica Sibley to conclude her first full year as TIME CEO by recognizing the incomparable Taylor Swift as the 2023 Person of the Year. Jess goes Inside the ICE House to provide a fly-on-the-wall perspective on the year-long selection process and to unpack the power of Swift’s global influence. She shares TIME’s still-unfolding evolution under her leadership and what the future may hold for the century-old American publishing icon.

If you’re on a smart phone, all of our Inside the ICE House podcast episodes are available wherever you get your podcasts, including the Apple Podcast App, Spotify, and Stitcher, and other audio platforms. Feel free to reach out to me with any feedback about our show, or suggest any guests for future episodes.