Anti smoking + more news

Why Is Vice Ditching Its Anti Smoking Past To Work For Philip Morris? | Co.Create – Vice has big marketing and media groups as shareholders including WPP. More tobacco related posts here. It will be interesting to see how the anti-smoking lobby reacts to it. There is something larger going on in the tobacco industry as it tried to push into vaping and heated tobacco products.

Nielsen COO Steve Hasker on Total Audience Measurement and Snapchat Deal | Adweek – interesting article on TV measurement

Vice Media Web Traffic Plunges 17% in February, Sunk by Risky Strategy | Variety – one month’s of comScore’s data doesn’t make a trend

Vice CEO Shane Smith to agencies: ‘We like you.’ | Digiday – might have something to do with their dramatic drop in website traffic… Vice has lost its outsider positioning and become part of the mainstream that it kicked against for so long. Still Shane Smith has done well out of it

More valuable brands in China | Shanghai Daily – Huawei ranks highly. Huawei is a client of WPP who own the company that created the brand ranking. As with many of things your mileage will vary considerably.

The Laughing Cow explores the true value of family time | Marketing Interactive – interesting positioning of the Laughing Cow brand. It’s classic FMCG thinking but with a twist

Gamasutra – Now’s the time to get into VR – but be realistic about its returns, says Palmer Luckey – the thing to keep an eye on is if e-sports athletes find an advantage in VR within a gaming environment. It will be interesting to see how various technology hurdles are handled. Making true VR content requires news processes, new approaches to narrative and storytelling. Will the cost of non-gaming content in VR be worthwhile? Lastly, lean back content is tremendously important as well, expect headsets to be used as ‘virtual screens’ for traditional content as a killer app. Not all that computing power will be needed. It will also work with small single person households were a 65 inch TV isn’t practical