What’s the biggest difference between Elon Musk and the CEO of The Onion? “I know I’m not funny—and he has no idea,” says Ben Collins, the former NBC
What’s the biggest difference between Elon Musk and the CEO of The Onion? “I know I’m not funny—and he has no idea,” says Ben Collins, the former NBC News reporter who bought the satirical newspaper with Twilio founder Jeff Lawson last year. In the 12 months since, The Onion has reached up-to-date comic heights—see: viral headlines like “Nation Can’t Believe It on Harvard’s Side”—while increasing its cultural footprint.
But again, Collins says, that’s because he’s been astute enough to leave the actual comedy to the experts. “There are definitely people who would come in here and just be like, ‘I’m the funniest man in the world. Let’s go attack trans people or something. That would be their version of what satire is. Just like, for example, the song ‘The Reason’ by Hoobastank is also technically music, it is not the kind of music that I want to listen to.”
Instead, Collins has focused on getting The Onion the resources it so desperately needed, as well as pruning back the bullshit so the paper’s content can shine. “We took this thing that was dying a slow internet heat death and turned it into a real newspaper and much bigger business,” he exclusively tells Vanity Fair. “There was a boner-pill ad shawl that covered all of our content, and you just couldn’t read it. We got rid of all of it. We reset revenue to zero for a month or two while we figured out how to make and ship a paper to tens of thousands of people.”
Collins has expanded the staff from 14 employees to 27; he anticipates hiring eight more by the end of the year. He’s invested resources into video content, relaunching parody television news network “ONN” (Onion News Network) on YouTube and—in a shocking move for any online publication in this day and age—he’s also brought back The Onion’s print arm, which initially folded in 2013.
“I’m not saying every newspaper should get back and print immediately. The New York Observer, or whatever the fuck, I don’t think it would behoove them to start doing this shit,” he says. “But we can be super funny in print, and people like getting a nice thing in the mail.” Although he’s quick to claim that, in some ways, he’s just been lucky, Collins also has a game plan for building a flourishing 21st-century media brand that he’s more than cheerful to share with other publications—eventually. “We want to help other people get into print soon,” he says. “That’s our plan too. It can’t just be us.”
In a degenerating industry where everyone is obsessed with doing more with less, Collins’s Onion is legitimately growing. “It’s like a miracle,” he says. “I wish the media didn’t have to collapse for people to have to look at us as a model for making money and being successful, but here we are.”
Below, Collins sits for a long chat about leaving NBC News after feuding with Elon Musk, his romantic relationship with aspiring politician Kat Abughazaleh, the status of The Onion’s attempt to purchase InfoWars, and so much more.
Vanity Fair: You were a reporter at NBC News before becoming CEO of The Onion. What was that transition like for you?
Ben Collins: I used to be a disinformation reporter. I was covering all these bad guys. There was a flip that switched a couple of years ago where I started seeing my bosses thinking, like, Uh oh, he’s going to continue to report on Elon Musk? This is not a great thing. Everyone could see them shaking their collars out. They were like, The fascism’s coming, and he’s still doing this? So it was a weird and awkward last year at my job.
I think I have some modicum of social skills. I can read the room. I know when I’m not welcome there anymore.
Did you feel that they were doing anything to impede your actual journalism?
Oh, dude. I got suspended for being too mean to Elon Musk. And by the way, it was for basically just reporting on him. It was not anything crazy.
After that, I realized my time on this peacock is brief. When I saw The Onion was for sale, I realized that maybe I didn’t have to live my entire life in this doldrumescent hell. I started chasing this thing, and we really did save it from what we would now call AI death. Or the throes of a decabillionaire who is worried about white genocide.
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