Vice Media is ready to do breaking news. Don't expect anchors at desks and scrolling graphics.
Vice News has launched with a series of videos from locations including Ukraine and Venezuela, featuring the organization's signature on-the-ground style and subjective approach, which it has brought to topics like North Korean labor camps and the Libyan Revolution.
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Vice had already offered news, but "this is a totally new platform," according to a rep. The new entity, which went live on Monday night, will have franchises like the Daily Vice News Capsule and more live stream coverage from breaking events. The organization has hired "tons" of new reporters for the venture, the rep added. Vice's current head count is more than 1,000 globally.
Vice started as an arts, culture and current events magazine in Montreal, and its entry into news coverage is the most high-profile indication to date that the now diverse media outlet is set to compete with the world's mainstream outlets.
The videos are similar to Vice's HBO series of short-form documentaries, but are a bit shorter — around four-and-a-half minutes. One of its first dispatches comes from outside a Ukrainian military base at which Russian troops had arrived.
The vertical follows recent efforts from Vice to build out its video and news efforts with the launch of a YouTube channel as well as the hiring of around 60 journalists. The Wall Street Journal reported in November that Vice had planned a $50 million investment in its news organization.
"We looked at how we should launch a sort of new product, something that isn't derivative, something that is new that's using technology. We're not just trying to be seen and liked," Vice cofounder CEO Shane Smith said.

Vice already boasts an impressive 35 offices around the world that have helped it report on topics rarely covered by mainstream news outlets. While the coverage has typically been centered on current events, Vice had rarely attempted to cover breaking news.
That has changed, however, with its live streaming of events in Ukraine and other places. Smith said the technology accessible for journalists helped them believe they could do news reporting in a fresh and innovative way.
"There is no hard and fast style guide to how Vice is going to look because we're trying all new things," he said. "I think it's barely possibly now. We're literally going out there right now at the first point where you can put all this shit together and have it work somewhat ... It's literally the wild west of technology now."
The news vertical is one of Vice's most ambitious efforts and now puts the company squarely in competition for stories with the likes of CNN or the BBC, at least online. They are targets that Smith has said he believes are vulnerable. "Young people, who are the majority of our audience, are angry, disenfranchised, and they don't like or trust mainstream media outlets," he recently told The Guardian.
Smith said that the company's path to news started with the success of the YouTube channel combined with a brainstorming session for the HBO show that generated some 3,800 story ideas.
"When we started with YouTube as part of the original channels, the advice we got was, 'Don't make it too newsy. Don't make it too international. Make it snackable. Make it short, and we of course made it newsy and long,'" he said.
While Vice may still seem like an counterculture upstart, its recent growth puts it ahead of many of the niche media organizations and even within striking distance of some of the mainstream competitors.
Most people finally began to take Vice seriously in August 2013, when 21st Century Fox took a 5% stake in the company. The investment valued Vice at $1.4 billion.
The influx of cash has spurred Vice to expand its coverage and build out new sections, including news and its recent food vertical launched with FremantleMedia. Vice reportedly brought in $175 million in 2012, although the Guardian says forecasts for 2014 are closer to $500 million.
Vice has even succeeded in spawning @Vice_is_hip, a popular parody of the company's style and sometimes off-the-wall takes on topics. The account has amassed more than 63,000 followers.
Why Beck's latest album is just a PowerPoint about a lonely squirrel
— VICE (@Vice_Is_Hip) March 4, 2014
While news coverage can be an expensive proposition, Smith said that Vice was well-positioned to enter the news space as well as many others; it had all the necessary infrastructure to build upon.
"We're making money, almost pure margin, off of things that we've already monetized here," he said. "We sort of looked at that and said we need to make more and better content in each vertical.
"There's going to be a lot more content coming out of Vice this year on a lot more platforms," Smith added. "You're going to see Vice everywhere."
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