• by Wayne Friedman , October 20, 2008

Tribune Company's licensing division has struck an agreement with mobile content distributor Vibes Media--Tribune's first major foray into distributing its content through a mobile provider.

Vibes says that is has already converted thousands of pieces of Tribune content into a mobile-ready format, which will be sent to a range of mobile service providers.

A 10-year-old Chicago-based company, Vibe has distributed some 50,000 mobile-marketing programs throughout the U.S. It currently distributes content from Garrison Keillor, Dave Barry, Wolfgang Puck, Rick Steves, Arianna Huffington and Carl Hiaasen, among others.

With Vibes, subscribers can sign up for daily alerts, jokes, horoscopes, and quotes as well as other original Vibes-created content.

"The TMS/Vibes partnership is the first significant mobile content distribution project TMS has undertaken," said Steve Tippie, TMS vice president of marketing and licensing. "I expect this to be the first in a series of mobile content projects we work on together."

One of the first companies to utilize the new service will be U.S. Cellular.