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In tonight’s edition, The Washington Post’s “Third Newsroom” was one of CEO Will Lewis’ big initiatives when he first landed at the paper, but since launching it has been plagued with low morale, confusion over its purpose, and frequent staff departures. We take a deep dive into what has happened at WP Ventures, plus we reveal a number of WaPo staffers taking the buyout. 

Also tonight, why Keith Poole’s New York Post has labelled Jon Kelly’s Puck a “loose with the facts newsletter.”

Now smile and say cheese! We have our first-ever Breaker Sun Valley family photo album! Find out which media billionaire was snapped with the CEO of Palantir, who was the well-known film producer photographed wearing a Free Press hat, plus (mostly) happy snaps of some other unlikely pairings at the annual summer camp for billionaires.

Mentioned tonight: Rupert Murdoch, Wendi Murdoch, Robert Thomson, Barry Diller, Joey Levin, Diane Von Furstenberg, Gayle King, Ted Sarandos, Ivanka Trump, David Zaslav, Jared Kushner, Sheryl Sandberg, Dara Khosrowshahi, Alex von Furstenberg, Bobby Kotick, Dana Kraft, Jason Blum, Brian Grazer, Andy Jass, Reid Hoffman, Jerry Yang, Josh D'Amaro, Neal Mohan, Gunnar Wiedenfels, Casey Wasserman, Hiroki Totoki, Daniel Ek, Tim Cook, Eddy Cue, Brian Roberts, John Elkann, Jasan Ballard, Luis von Ahn, Barry McCarthy, Andrew Ross Sorkin, Matt Murray, Sally Buzbee, Josh Dawsey, Rob Winnett, Krissah Thompson, Tyler Pager, Samantha Henig, Isaac Arnsdorf, Rachel Tashjian, Micah Gelman, Hank Stuever, Dave Jorgenson, Mike Semel, David Ignatius, Dan Balz and Charlie Rose.

(Exclusive.) On Wednesday, Washington Post CEO Will Lewis emailed staff with one of those inspiring missives he has become well known for.

The email encouraged those who “do not feel aligned” with the company’s new vision to consider taking a buyout. 

“If we want to reconnect with our audience and continue to defend democracy, more changes at the Post will be necessary,” he told battle-weary staff at the Post, where morale is at rock bottom.

But it was what the memo omitted that was glaring.

Lewis, nicknamed “Thirsty Will” (by colleagues – and Private Eye – while running the Telegraph in London owing to his love of a refreshing beverage), touted the reimagined Opinion section (“to champion tireless American values”), flexible subscription payments, and embracing AI. 

However, there was no mention of one of Lewis’s first big plays when he took over The Washington Post – “The Third Newsroom” (known internally as WP Ventures).

Breaker has learned that’s because…