• by Gavin O'Malley  @mp_gavin, March 8, 2007

Fox Entertainment Group has found a digital media head inside the News Corp. family. It's Dan Fawcett, who joined the company in 1997 at Fox Sports Net and has spent the past three years as executive vice president of programming, business and legal affairs for the DirecTV satellite television service provider.

Fawcett, 43, fills a position that has been vacant since November--when Peter Levinsohn moved to Fox Interactive Media, replacing his cousin Ross Levinsohn. Ross Levinsohn is largely credited for News Corp.'s decision to acquire MySpace in 2005 for $580 million.

In this new role, Fawcett will be expected to grow Fox's digital media operation, with a strategy that includes exploiting Fox content across all digital platforms and with major technology players.

Upon Wednesday's announcement, Peter Chernin, president and chief operating officer of News Corp., noted Fawcett's "deep understanding of this company and a strong history over the past decade in structuring and negotiating successful distribution deals on numerous platforms."

The recent changes in digital leadership at Fox have not slowed its online pursuits. Last month, in an effort to boost revenues on MySpace and its other Web properties, Fox Interactive acquired ad technology firm Strategic Data Corp., which specializes in improving online ad performance and data mining.

On Wednesday at the Bear Stearns media conference, Peter Levinsohn said MySpace is in "very active" discussions with other media companies to distribute video not owned by News Corp.

Fox Interactive properties drew 62 million unique visitors and nearly 30 billion page views in January, according to Nielsen//NetRatings.