VICE Media Group Unveils VICE World News, iHeartRadio Audio Pact

During its NewFronts presentation earlier this week, VICE Media Group revealed its new global news offering as well as an audio storytelling partnership with iHeartRadio.

VICE World News will build off the success of VICE News in the U.S., rolling out hundreds of hours of international television, digital and audio news programming for audiences worldwide. The program will include enterprise and investigative reporting; day-of coverage; unique second-day analysis; and reporting on issues relevant across the globe, told by local VICE News journalists. Under the new global banner, VICE World News will create documentaries, half-hour docuseries and weekly shows as well as digital video, written editorial, vertical video formats and original podcasts.

Television programming currently in production to be released in the U.S. and internationally includes Border to Border with David Noriega; video-game centered Reset; Fanatics, about the power of fandoms; and The Source, which will peel back the layers of the world’s biggest stories to uncover where they began.

VICE Media Group is launching with iHeartRadio VICE News Reports, a new weekly investigative podcast series covering critical news subjects from around the world. As part of the new partnership, iHeartMedia will have a first-look option to co-produce additional podcasts based on VICE Media Group content. VICE News Reports will debut this fall on iHeartRadio and everywhere podcasts are available.

The tentatively titled Disruptors with Jemele Hill and Cari Champion is set to soon premiere on VICE TV. The weekly talk show will feature Hill and Champion unpacking the biggest topics and headlines of the week in an unfiltered conversation. Disruptors will also feature guest experts, thought leaders and changemakers.

VICE Media Group is launching The 8:46 Project, a company-wide commitment to expand coverage and reporting on systemic racism across all of VICE’s brands, including VICE News, VICE Digital, Noisey, Munchies and VICE TV. VICE Media Group’s The 2030 Project, meanwhile, is a paid, 12-month long program, inviting a group of young people, from diverse backgrounds and experiences, into the organization to look ten years into the future and envision what life might be like for their own generation come 2030.

Further, through a new brand safety initiative, VICE Media Group is calling upon advertisers to support journalism and the stories that matter. The company is asking brand marketers to call upon their agencies to review and question the words that make up their blocklists, and for agencies to reassess the practice of keyword blocklists and instead look to more contextual-based solutions.