Viz magazine this week thumbed its nose at the ad industry with the
launch of a controversial new site on the Internet.
The fortnightly title also threw down a challenge to creatives to come
up with more suitable advertising for the magazine.
The Internet site is aimed at the ad industry and is being billed as
‘anti-advertising, anti-Internet’. It is hosted by the Viz character,
Dickie Beasley, and is located at http://www.viz.co.uk.
The site was set up by the communications company, PPN, despite claimed
opposition from Chris Donald, the editor. ‘The Internet is just a big
electronic postal system for sad bastards looking for pen pals,’ he
said.
Although Donald maintains that the advertising in Viz is ‘boring and
predictable’, he admitted the magazine would like to attract advertisers
in the financial services and automotive sectors.
‘It would be nice to think we could keep milking the advertisers by
hiking the price,’ Donald said, adding: ‘We are also challenging
creatives to come up with advertising suitable for Viz.’
Donald went on to say: ‘Any artist who devotes their talent to selling
products is a prostitute. People higher up the tree, like the Saatchi
brothers, are pimps.’
Viz is published by John Brown Publishing, the company founded by its
managing director, John Brown.
