Vice News

This article is about VICE News. For information on Vice media, see Vice Media, Inc..
Vice News
Launched 2013 (2013)
Owned by Vice Media
Picture format 1080p HD (depends on connection)
Slogan created by and for a connected generation
Country United States
Language English
Headquarters New York City
Sister channel(s) Television
Viceland (February 2016)
Viceland Canada (February 2016)
Online
Vice Films
Vice Magazine
Website https://news.vice.com
Streaming media
YouTube Vice News
Vice and Vice News apps Android and iOS

Vice News (stylised as VICE News) is Vice Media, Inc.'s current affairs channel, producing daily documentary essays and video through its website and YouTube channel. It promotes itself on its coverage of "under-reported stories".[1] Vice News was created in December 2013 and is based in New York City, though it has bureaus worldwide.

Background

In December 2013, Vice Media expanded its international news division into an independent division dedicated to news exclusively and created Vice News. Vice Media put $50 million into its news division, which now has 34 bureaus worldwide and has been praised for in-depth coverage of international news.[2] Vice News has primarily targeted a younger audience comprised predominantly of millennials, the same audience to which its parent company appeals.[3]

History

Before Vice News was founded, Vice published news documentaries and news reports from around the world through its YouTube channel alongside other programs. Vice had reported on events such as Crime in Venezuela, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Protests in Turkey, the North Korean regime, and the Syrian Civil War through their own YouTube channel and website. After the creation of Vice News as a separate division, its reporting greatly increased with worldwide coverage starting immediately with videos published on YouTube and articles on its website daily.[4]

In August 2013, Rupert Murdoch's corporation 21st Century Fox invested $70 million (US) in Vice Media (of which Vice News is a division), resulting in a 5% stake.[5][6]

On 29 August 2014, A&E Networks—a joint venture of Hearst Corporation and The Walt Disney Company—announced it would acquire a 10% minority stake in Vice Media, Vice News' parent company, for $250 million.[7]

On 17 September 2014, Vice News launched a mobile phone app for iOS.[8]

In November 2014, Vice News launched its French-language version.[9][10]

Reporters

Vice News has more than 100 members of its reporting and editorial staff in 35 bureaus around the world including New York, Toronto, London, Berlin, Mexico City, São Paulo, Los Angeles, Istanbul, Moscow, Beijing, and Kabul.[11][12] On April 21 2014, while covering the conflict in Ukraine, Simon Ostrovsky, a Vice News reporter was kidnapped by pro-Russian militia and held for three days until being released in Sloviansk. [13][14] In 2015 two journalists and their translator were arrested in Turkey. The two journalists were released.

Programming and content

Since its creation, Vice News has covered emerging events and widespread issues around the world. Every day it publishes a daily news capsule called "News Beyond the Headlines" where it briefly covers four daily stories which did not receive much coverage by other mainstream news outlets but it still considers important. It also publishes daily articles on its website on a variety of world current events, along with maintaining a Vice News Wire where it displays wire reports from around the world.[15]

It has several prominent past and ongoing documentary series including: Russian military intervention in Ukraine; civil war in Iraq; the Israeli–Palestinian conflict; the Western Sahara conflict; the struggles of Afghan interpreters working for the US military in acquiring visas; the prison crisis in the US at Salinas Valley State Prison; protests against the world cup in Brazil; Venezuelan anti-government protests; expansion of the Islamic State; protests in Ferguson, Missouri; the Syrian Civil War; the militarization of America's police forces and Central American refugess fleeing street gangs borne in American prisons to cross the American border; Global Warming and the evidence of the melting of Antarctica's glaciers; and the build-up of military forces of Russia with Scandinavians assisted by the American military.

Television series

Reception

The Vice News YouTube page has around 1.5 million subscribers as well as more than 315 million views in total. and in August 2014, was described by The Guardian as one of the fastest growing channels on YouTube.[17]

Lara Pendergast, deputy online editor at the UK magazine The Spectator argues that Vice News gets its strength and popularity by getting younger audiences to become more and more interested about international news in a way that traditional media has not. “It’s videos may fail every rule in the BBC impartiality book, but they are brilliantly edited and, often, utterly compelling. Vice News has found young, fearless foreign correspondents to serve a youthful audience who are bored stiff by traditional outlets but are quite prepared to watch videos on their mobile phones.”

"Vice’s brand image marketing as an edgy, hip outlet have helped drive its popularity with young people," says media critic Charles Johnson. “Mainstream media is not trusted by a lot of people, and rightly so, so they [Vice] step in and fill in,” he says. “People see a sense of fun behind it. Jon Stewart is very popular, but he’s an entertainer. Vice is something similar.”[18]

Rick Edmonds, media and business analyst at the Poynter Institute, critiques that Vice News’ reportings are “raw and tasteless sometimes, on topics where traditional news media look to provide balance, Vice often offers journalism akin to personal essays.” Other critiques mention that their work is more affiliated with entertainment rather than hard-hitting news.

Editor of the New York-based Foreign Policy Association Robert Nolan, stated that Vice’s North Korea reporting was “more ‘Jackass’ than journalism,” (referring to the Jackass TV series), in a 2013 opinion piece for U.S. News and World Report.[18][19]

ISIS Controversy

In August 2014, Vice News sent reporter Medyan Dairieh to spend time with ISIS members in the group's de facto capital, Raqqa in Syria. He gained unique access to a group that is known for video-taping the beheading of reporters, without getting into danger himself. The resulting documentary now has around eight million views on YouTube. It shows images of decapitated bodies and the proclamation by young children of their desire for jihad. This achievement by Vice News was controversial owing to its uncommon degree of access to the militant group. This led to accusations that it "had become too cosy with a murderous terrorist organization and that it was unwittingly spreading the group’s propaganda”.

Vice News's editor-in-chief denied the accusations, saying “I can certainly say that there was no collusion between Vice News and the Islamic State as much as there is a bit of sparring and each of us probably trying to get something different out of that.”

See also

References

  1. ↑ "About Us". Vice News. Retrieved 2014-07-11.
  2. ↑ "Vice News Launches, Promising 'Changing Of The Guard In Media'". Forbes. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  3. ↑ "Vice News, where video works". Politico. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  4. ↑ "Vice News Is Seriously Very Serious (SRSLY)". Advertising Age. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  5. ↑ Ben Quinn (17 August 2013). "Rupert Murdoch firm dips into hipsters' bible with $70m stake in Vice". The Guardian (London). Retrieved 12 October 2014.
  6. ↑ Anthony Ha (16 August 2013). "Fox Invests in Vice, A Media Company That Makes Money Being Terrible And Brilliant". TechCrunch. AOL, Inc. Retrieved 12 October 2014.
  7. ↑ "A&E Networks Buying Minority Stake in Vice Media". 29 August 2014. Retrieved 12 October 2014.
  8. ↑ "Vice News Launches New Mobile App", Vice News. Retrieved August 17, 2014.
  9. ↑ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/17/vice-news-expansion-global_n_6002932.html
  10. ↑ http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/oct/17/vice-media-youtube-news-channel-new-york-local-language-launch
  11. ↑ "Vice News wants to take documentary-style storytelling to hot spots around the globe". Nieman Journalism Lab. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  12. ↑ "A First Look at Vice News with Shane Smith". Vice. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  13. ↑ "Vice Reporter Simon Ostrovsky 'Kidnapped' In Ukraine". Huffington Post UK. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  14. ↑ "Vice Correspondent Simon Ostrovsky Released In Ukraine". The Huffington Post. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  15. ↑ "Vice Media Bulks Up News Division". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 2014-07-21.
  16. ↑ http://www.citytv.com/toronto/shows/vice-on-city/
  17. ↑ http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/aug/23/vice-news-younger-viewers-bbc-channel-4-youtube-social-media
  18. 1 2 http://globaljournalist.org/2014/09/despite-controversies-vice-news-thrives-young-audience/
  19. ↑ http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/mar/02/vice-media-shane-smith-north-korea

External links

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