Viceland TV Channel To Run Native Samsung Ads In Lieu Of Some Commercial Breaks

On Vice’s new television channel Viceland, the $4 billion media giant is taking a unique approach to advertising.

In lieu of some traditional commercials during its primetime programming this spring, Viceland is set to premiere a native ad campaign of sorts in partnership with Samsung that aims to spotlight virtual reality. The collaboration kicks off tonight with a two-minute clip airing on Viceland, where filmmakers and VR futurists ponder the wonders of the burgeoning medium.

As part of the project, Viceland and Samsung will create VR projects alongside thought leaders in worlds like film, music, and gaming, Vice said, which will be exclusive to the Samsung Milk VR content platform and viewable with Samsung Gear VR headsets. But documentaries about the making of these projects will air on Viceland adjacent to its primetime programming, with 30-second cutdowns of the documentaries also running in place of other regularly scheduled commercial breaks.

“With our new partnership with Samsung we are reaching out to our favorite creative minds to reimagine the kinds of stories we can create within this new [virtual reality] paradigm,” Vice’s chief creative officer, Eddy Moretti, said in a statement. “We want to pioneer storytelling ‘beyond the frame’ and to connect with audiences in completely new, and emotional, ways.”

The new initiative arrives as Vice faces some controversy about early ratings for its one-month-old channel — amid comments from CNN worldwide president Jeff Zucker and a report in the International Business Times alleging that the network’s average daily viewership is 77 percent lower than the channel that preceded it, H2.

While Viceland’s Nielsen ratings will be kept private for its first six months, a Viceland spokesperson told Adweek that the data cited by IBT didn’t focus on the key 18-34 demo that Viceland is targeting. “We’ve seen tremendous consumption across all screens for our programming,” the spokesperson said, “with growth continuing to climb.”