October 20, 2017

I know my calculus: It says Vice + Vogue = $$$

by

Vogue editor Anna Wintour.

Let’s say you’re really into fashion and luxury, but also really into gritty, hipster exposés and video… where would you turn for your daily news intake? If you fall in that shared bit of an otherwise mind-numbing Venn diagram, then you’ll be pleasantly surprised to hear that Vogue and Vice are teaming up to start a new online platform, called “Project Vs.”

The new site hopes to offer up “a mix of videos, photos, long form storytelling and other elements that will all be promoted by both media companies on social media,” writes Hazel Cills for Jezebel. Mmmkay, so more of the same.

Cills includes Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour’s own words on the matter. Besides running the magazine since 1988, Wintour became the artistic director of Condé Nast, which owns Vogue, in 2013.

Vogue and Vice may appear to some to see the world through different lenses. But, in my view, both are fearless and breathtaking, with unquenchable curiosity and vigor. This collaboration will benefit from two talented editorial teams working together to produce relevant and exciting stories about the way we live now.”

Brian Steinberg takes a more in-depth look at the collaboration for Variety, exploring how the division of labor at the new site will work. Condé Nast will handle the advertising and financial planning, and digital editors from both outlets will maintain editorial direction.

The full plan, Steinberg writes, was to be unveiled last night at Final Front, an annual conference organized by Omnicom Media Group to help media outlets find corporate collaborators (think AppleAT&TAudiPepsi, the list goes on…) with whom to synergistically expand their reach.

Steinberg writes:

Advertisers need seamless interplay between traditional media like print and TV and emerging digital and social techniques… Sometimes, such stuff can only be found when experts from each area agree to link hands.

Many unorthodox team-ups will take place at the Omnicom event. Viacom’s MTV will team up with Shazam. NBCUniversal will present ideas with Buzzfeed. Others taking part include ABC, Reddit, Discovery Communications, Fullscreen, 21st Century Fox, Live Nation and PopSugar.

Vice Media cofounders: Shane Smith (l) and Suroosh Alvi (r)

Yesterday, Fashionista’s Alyssa Vingan Klein posted some teaser video by Wintour and Vice’s Shane Smith, wherein the two media heavyweights list off stereotypes about each other’s audiences. I guess the video is minutely endearing—really only on Wintour’s side, as she drolly describes the “typical” Vice reader, and then reaches for her cue cards, wondering aloud how much is left—but Klein brings up another important point: what of Vice’s very own, fashion-forward sites like i-D and Garage? How are staffers there feeling about the initiative?

The answer seems simple enough. This move, like so many in Big media, is all about the money, baby! Presumably, as long as the bucks roll in, everyone will be happy.

 

 

 

 

Alex Primiani is the associate director of publicity at Melville House.

MobyLives