Bill Burke is a graduate of Amherst College and received his M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School in 1992.
His father, Daniel B. Burke, was president and chief executive of Capital Cities/ABC before it was sold to the Walt Disney Company in 1996; his older brother, Stephen B. Burke, is president of Comcast. (An uncle, James E. Burke, was chief executive of Johnson & Johnson).
After Harvard Business School he was hired by the Turner Entertainment Group in 1992 as director of business development, where he developed the cable network Turner Classic Movies — which propelled him, at age 29, to the position of president of TBS. A high-level digital job at Time Warner overseeing the Internet strategy for CNN.com and Time Inc. Interactive followed after Mr. Turner sold his company to Time Warner in 1996. He left Time Warner just before its ill-fated deal with America Online Burke served as president and CEO of RSN, a broadcast TV and Internet company targeting the active outdoor sports market for a while, and after a stint running the Weather Channel, Mr. Burke moved to Maine.
He is a national trustee for the Boys & Girls Clubs of America and a trustee at Maine Medical Center. He also has served on the Board of Directors for The Clean Air Campaign, the Emma L. Bowen Foundation for Minorities in Media and The Carter Center Board of Councilors.