The Culture Journalist is a podcast about culture and the media in the age of platforms, hosted by Emilie Friedlander and Andrea Domanick. If you love this show, get value out of it, and believe in paying people for their work, consider supporting us by becoming a paid subscriber. Paid subscribers receive free bonus episodes, along with full essays and culture recommendations.
Hello everyone. We’re interrupting our regular programming this week to bring you a taste of something different: On Monday, the journalist Max Tani reported that VICE Media paid its executives out over a million dollars in bonuses in the weeks before filing for bankruptcy — so our friends at Nersey, a new podcast that bears no relation to the VICE music vertical by the same name, convened an emergency pod to talk about it. Emilie joined hosts Trey Smith, Slava P. and boyfriend-of-The-Culture-Journalist Drew Millard to share war stories from their time at VICE and dig into a 139-page “statement of financial affairs” on file with the Southern District of New York, which reveals just how much the company was paying its top brass (among other itemized expenditures) in the months leading up to the Chapter 11 declaration.
The Culture Journalist bears no responsibility for anything that’s said herein by these guys — though Nersey touches on similar topics to ours, it’s much looser in format. But we’re sharing their episode on our channels because, well, we think you might enjoy the pod. As for TCJ, we’ll be back to business as usual starting next week.
Subscribe to Nersey here
Donate to a hardship fund started by recent TCJ guest Sara David for VICE workers who were laid off this spring but have yet to receive severance from the company.
Read Katie Way’s excellent reporting on the story for Hell Gate NYC
Inside the VICE bankruptcy files