7 ms·

IIRC, I was introduced to Vice with their fascinating coverage of North Korea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24R8JObNNQ4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24R8

by Reedx 8y ago

IIRC, I was introduced to Vice with their fascinating coverage of North Korea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24R8JObNNQ4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24R8JObNNQ4 (first trip - Shane Smith was banned from the country as a result) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrCQh1usdzE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrCQh1usdzE (second trip years later, where they got in under the guise of a Basketball game) Unfortunately it's been increasingly hit or miss ever since and now their process seems to be along these lines: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw5UzBjgCiI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw5UzBjgCiI Also, how is it that so many of these media companies are having layoffs at almost exactly the same time? You'd think it'd be more scattered...

52-6F-62 8y ago
It's happening in Canada as well. They're just not making enough money. They're making money, but not enough. There's a large drive to produce more with less, and to reboot. Journalism, especially good journalism, is expensive. Expensive to execute, and expensive to produce. And everybody wants it for free now.
- dleslie 8y ago
  Vice was cheap to run, for a time. It started as a niche magazine in Quebec and expanded into yellow journalism with cheap to make, but provocative, YouTube documentaries. Then it was acquired and it pivoted sharply into being a media and news portal, with a presence on nigh every platform. The content quickly expanded in quantity, and critically overloaded itself in trying to dominate online discussion in every space.
  - 52-6F-62 8y ago
    Vice isn't cheap to run, now, though. And that last statement is a lot of conjecture. Unless you have proof of some conspiracy to dominate online discussion in every space. They do cover a wide variety of subjects, only a couple of which I've read—and they seem generally good, with the odd very good piece. Most media companies run a small gamut of niche categories: lifestyle, fashion, news, business, tech, finance, etc.
    - dleslie 8y ago
      I think their rapid expansion of properties, some enormous, after 2010 speaks for itself. [0] 0: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_Media#Properties https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_Media#Properties
      - 52-6F-62 8y ago
        Then I guess we just disagree, and it's more a matter of opinion than it is a fact.
  - solarkraft 8y ago
    > cheap to make, but provocative, YouTube documentaries That's exactly what I liked from them, but I don't really see that anymore. Motherboard is okay. That's pretty much my contact with Vice.
  - blacksmith_tb 8y ago
    That's interesting, I would have thought the costs associated with printing a paper magazine would be fairly high compared with digital distribution, though?
    - IAmEveryone 8y ago
      It’s rather meaningless compared to what the newsroom costs.
  - chipotle_coyote 8y ago
    > Then it was acquired By who? The Wikipedia article on Vice Media says they were acquired in 1999--without listing who the acquirers were--but also says that the cofounders bought it back in 2001. All of the pivoting you're talking about appears to have happened under the original management, in any case, didn't it? They've had investment from a bunch of "old media" companies over the years, but original founder Shane Smith retained a controlling interest. (It looks like Disney will own more of the company than he does once their merger with Fox is completed.)
    - dleslie 8y ago
      It's not an acquisition, per se, so much as some of it was acquired and the leadership changed at a time that major changes were being undertaken. At a time when the executive controlled roughly 3/4 of Vice, Fox purchased 5% of it; other major media have done so. Shortly before this occurance, Gavin McInnes had left his leadership role over alleged differences of opinion on how to run Vice Media. His departure, the arrival of large media conglomerates as large minority shareholders, and the rapid expansion of Vice into new properties and markets all occur within a very short time span.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- untog 8y ago
  They're also falling victim to many of the traps startups do with regard to VC funding. Vice (and Buzzfeed for that matter) are ticking along nicely, generating a profit. But they're not generating enough profit for their investors, so they're forced to jump through cost-cutting hoops that will ultimately be to the detriment of their product.
  - mrguyorama 8y ago
    I wonder if there was ever a time in history where it was okay to just run a business and make some money.
    - bdamm 8y ago
      Still can be done. Just gotta stay private.
      - lotsofpulp 8y ago
        Even private businesses are at risk of a well funded company coming undercutting them on costs until they sell themselves or fold.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      The majority of businesses still work that way. VC backed companies are outliers but they are in the press a lot.
      - joncrane 8y ago
        Any publicly held company is ethically obligated to maximize profits as the agents of the shareholders, the vast majority of which only want the stock price to be maximized.
    - InitialLastName 8y ago
      Can only work if everyone whose money you're using to run the business is OK with it.
- richardhod 8y ago
  Vice doesn't pay well either, even for journalism, which isn't a high paid profession. https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/Vice-Media-Reviews-E26906.htm https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/Vice-Media-Reviews-E2690... https://gawker.com/working-at-vice-media-is-not-as-cool-as-it-seems-1579711577 https://gawker.com/working-at-vice-media-is-not-as-cool-as-i...
- Yhippa 8y ago
  > And everybody wants it for free now. I'm willing to pay for it but I know not everybody is. Like, the vast majority of people. It's very similar to the F2P game space. Nobody wants to pay for games so studios release games which seem to have used the laws of economics to extract the optimal amount of money from people. These games don't seem like good or fun games to me but they do entertain a lot of people. Same for a lot of these articles. A lot of clickbait and shallow content.
- awakeasleep 8y ago
  "Everybody wants it for free now" This overlooks the role Google and Facebook play in draining all advertising money from every other industry. People always wanted their news for free, and it worked just fine before advertising got so concentrated.
cryoshon 8y ago
yes, i was the same way. my interest was sustained by simon ostrovsky's dispatches from the war in ukraine as well as the gonzo documentary hijinks of david choe's quest to hitchhike across the US. they have fallen a very long way since then. i stopped reading them a few years ago when it was clear they were unapologetically trash.
- wyclif 8y ago
  I was thinking the same. This is peak Vice for me: https://youtu.be/Yknrg-63674 https://youtu.be/Yknrg-63674
solarkraft 8y ago
> Unfortunately it's been increasingly hit or miss ever since and now their process seems to be along these lines: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw5UzBjgCiI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw5UzBjgCiI Wonderful. I've been thinking about an excuse to post this even before clicking the discussion link.
- Rebelgecko 8y ago
  Episode 2 of Documentary Now on Netflix/IFC is also a pretty good parody of their style. The episode is called Dronez: The Hunt for El Chingon
ben_jones 8y ago
I think we're seeing it all happen at once because it means the negative PR is spread around and not targeted at a specific organization. Media groups essentially have free reign to fire whoever they want under the guise of a 'current media crisis'.
siruncledrew 8y ago
Documentary Now actually got me to look more into Vice with their 'Dronez' episode: https://www.netflix.com/title/80010778 https://www.netflix.com/title/80010778
mzs 8y ago
McClatchy offers buy-outs to 10% today as well. https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/mcclatchy-follows-buzzfeed-vice-and-others-in-cutting-staff-11070151 https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/mcclatchy-follows-buzzfee... I have a sense that big waves like this are a leading indicator for market as a whole.
Bartweiss 8y ago
> how is it that so many of these media companies are having layoffs at almost exactly the same time? You'd think it'd be more scattered... I've been wondering this myself. One possibility is that lots of companies had layoffs proposed/planned, and they've accelerated their schedules to be part of the "wave". Better for investor confidence to be one more name in a followup story than to be your own headline. Another is that the October-onwards stock drop eroded the prospects of a lot of borderline companies all at once. I'd be a bit surprised by both the timing (well into the rally) and the ownership range (everything from private founder-owned to private Disney-owned to public) though. Third, I suppose, is that they didn't have them planned but saw an opportunity. If you lay off 10% of your staff in isolation, you might well lose another 5-10% of the best people who go find safer jobs. But if there's a clear industry crunch, it becomes a more appealing way to balance the budget because you can deflect the anger and resignations that otherwise come along with layoffs.

by Reedx 8y ago

52-6F-62 8y ago

It's happening in Canada as well. They're just not making enough money. They're making money, but not enough. There's a large drive to produce more with less, and to reboot. Journalism, especially good journalism, is expensive. Expensive to execute, and expensive to produce. And everybody wants it for free now.

dleslie 8y ago
Vice was cheap to run, for a time. It started as a niche magazine in Quebec and expanded into yellow journalism with cheap to make, but provocative, YouTube documentaries. Then it was acquired and it pivoted sharply into being a media and news portal, with a presence on nigh every platform. The content quickly expanded in quantity, and critically overloaded itself in trying to dominate online discussion in every space.
- 52-6F-62 8y ago
  Vice isn't cheap to run, now, though. And that last statement is a lot of conjecture. Unless you have proof of some conspiracy to dominate online discussion in every space. They do cover a wide variety of subjects, only a couple of which I've read—and they seem generally good, with the odd very good piece. Most media companies run a small gamut of niche categories: lifestyle, fashion, news, business, tech, finance, etc.
  - dleslie 8y ago
    I think their rapid expansion of properties, some enormous, after 2010 speaks for itself. [0] 0: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_Media#Properties https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_Media#Properties
    - 52-6F-62 8y ago
      Then I guess we just disagree, and it's more a matter of opinion than it is a fact.
- solarkraft 8y ago
  > cheap to make, but provocative, YouTube documentaries That's exactly what I liked from them, but I don't really see that anymore. Motherboard is okay. That's pretty much my contact with Vice.
- blacksmith_tb 8y ago
  That's interesting, I would have thought the costs associated with printing a paper magazine would be fairly high compared with digital distribution, though?
  - IAmEveryone 8y ago
    It’s rather meaningless compared to what the newsroom costs.
- chipotle_coyote 8y ago
  > Then it was acquired By who? The Wikipedia article on Vice Media says they were acquired in 1999--without listing who the acquirers were--but also says that the cofounders bought it back in 2001. All of the pivoting you're talking about appears to have happened under the original management, in any case, didn't it? They've had investment from a bunch of "old media" companies over the years, but original founder Shane Smith retained a controlling interest. (It looks like Disney will own more of the company than he does once their merger with Fox is completed.)
  - dleslie 8y ago
    It's not an acquisition, per se, so much as some of it was acquired and the leadership changed at a time that major changes were being undertaken. At a time when the executive controlled roughly 3/4 of Vice, Fox purchased 5% of it; other major media have done so. Shortly before this occurance, Gavin McInnes had left his leadership role over alleged differences of opinion on how to run Vice Media. His departure, the arrival of large media conglomerates as large minority shareholders, and the rapid expansion of Vice into new properties and markets all occur within a very short time span.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
untog 8y ago
They're also falling victim to many of the traps startups do with regard to VC funding. Vice (and Buzzfeed for that matter) are ticking along nicely, generating a profit. But they're not generating enough profit for their investors, so they're forced to jump through cost-cutting hoops that will ultimately be to the detriment of their product.
- mrguyorama 8y ago
  I wonder if there was ever a time in history where it was okay to just run a business and make some money.
  - bdamm 8y ago
    Still can be done. Just gotta stay private.
    - lotsofpulp 8y ago
      Even private businesses are at risk of a well funded company coming undercutting them on costs until they sell themselves or fold.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    The majority of businesses still work that way. VC backed companies are outliers but they are in the press a lot.
    - joncrane 8y ago
      Any publicly held company is ethically obligated to maximize profits as the agents of the shareholders, the vast majority of which only want the stock price to be maximized.
  - InitialLastName 8y ago
    Can only work if everyone whose money you're using to run the business is OK with it.
richardhod 8y ago
Vice doesn't pay well either, even for journalism, which isn't a high paid profession. https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/Vice-Media-Reviews-E26906.htm https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/Vice-Media-Reviews-E2690... https://gawker.com/working-at-vice-media-is-not-as-cool-as-it-seems-1579711577 https://gawker.com/working-at-vice-media-is-not-as-cool-as-i...
Yhippa 8y ago
> And everybody wants it for free now. I'm willing to pay for it but I know not everybody is. Like, the vast majority of people. It's very similar to the F2P game space. Nobody wants to pay for games so studios release games which seem to have used the laws of economics to extract the optimal amount of money from people. These games don't seem like good or fun games to me but they do entertain a lot of people. Same for a lot of these articles. A lot of clickbait and shallow content.
awakeasleep 8y ago
"Everybody wants it for free now" This overlooks the role Google and Facebook play in draining all advertising money from every other industry. People always wanted their news for free, and it worked just fine before advertising got so concentrated.

cryoshon 8y ago

yes, i was the same way. my interest was sustained by simon ostrovsky's dispatches from the war in ukraine as well as the gonzo documentary hijinks of david choe's quest to hitchhike across the US. they have fallen a very long way since then. i stopped reading them a few years ago when it was clear they were unapologetically trash.

wyclif 8y ago
I was thinking the same. This is peak Vice for me: https://youtu.be/Yknrg-63674 https://youtu.be/Yknrg-63674

solarkraft 8y ago

> Unfortunately it's been increasingly hit or miss ever since and now their process seems to be along these lines: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw5UzBjgCiI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw5UzBjgCiI Wonderful. I've been thinking about an excuse to post this even before clicking the discussion link.

Rebelgecko 8y ago
Episode 2 of Documentary Now on Netflix/IFC is also a pretty good parody of their style. The episode is called Dronez: The Hunt for El Chingon

ben_jones 8y ago

I think we're seeing it all happen at once because it means the negative PR is spread around and not targeted at a specific organization. Media groups essentially have free reign to fire whoever they want under the guise of a 'current media crisis'.

siruncledrew 8y ago

Documentary Now actually got me to look more into Vice with their 'Dronez' episode: https://www.netflix.com/title/80010778 https://www.netflix.com/title/80010778

mzs 8y ago

McClatchy offers buy-outs to 10% today as well. https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/mcclatchy-follows-buzzfeed-vice-and-others-in-cutting-staff-11070151 https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/mcclatchy-follows-buzzfee... I have a sense that big waves like this are a leading indicator for market as a whole.

Bartweiss 8y ago

> how is it that so many of these media companies are having layoffs at almost exactly the same time? You'd think it'd be more scattered... I've been wondering this myself. One possibility is that lots of companies had layoffs proposed/planned, and they've accelerated their schedules to be part of the "wave". Better for investor confidence to be one more name in a followup story than to be your own headline. Another is that the October-onwards stock drop eroded the prospects of a lot of borderline companies all at once. I'd be a bit surprised by both the timing (well into the rally) and the ownership range (everything from private founder-owned to private Disney-owned to public) though. Third, I suppose, is that they didn't have them planned but saw an opportunity. If you lay off 10% of your staff in isolation, you might well lose another 5-10% of the best people who go find safer jobs. But if there's a clear industry crunch, it becomes a more appealing way to balance the budget because you can deflect the anger and resignations that otherwise come along with layoffs.