Inc. named Aereo, the broadcast TV subscription service, and viral-media startup Upworthy among our Most Audacious Companies this year, their bold navigation through the opportunities and perils of the media landscape being perfectly in tune with all we've celebrated throughout our 35 years. But those perils snagged Aereo founder Chet Kanojia in late June, when the Supreme Court KO'd the company's service. He joined us, along with Upworthy's Eli Pariser and Suroosh Alvi of the streetsmart Vice Media, to discuss his next moves--and much more.
In a conversation with Jon Fine.
Vice began 20 years ago as a free publication, the Voice of Montreal. What were your ambitions then, Suroosh?
Suroosh Alvi: We launched an English magazine in a city with a shrinking English market that already had two English-language weeklies. The economics did not make any sense whatsoever. I thought it would be a single issue, and I'd be able to say, "Hey, I did this." Or maybe this thing could be huge. We were on welfare and eating beans and rice for years, but we'd still joke, "We're gonna take over the world"--that us-versus-them global domination thing. But it was hard to visualize what that would look like.