great-magazine-die-off

Scant Future For Plenty

Ryan Tate · 01/05/09 10:05PM

It turns out Plenty was paying attention to the wrong climate change: A tipster tells us the environmental magazine laid off almost the entire staff today after a funding round fell through.

Radar: The Final Insult

Sheila · 12/27/08 10:27AM

Radar magazine died a particularly gruesome death in its third iteration: bought by AMI, its website was gutted and replaced by a terrible Zombie Radar. Now, print mag subscribers received one last insult via postcard:

Media Obituaries Reduced To Twitter Length

Ryan Tate · 12/15/08 05:38AM

It's very logical and very sad: Publication shut-downs and layoffs are coming so quickly they can only be effectively tracked at 140 characters or less, on Twitter.

Magazine Death Rumormonger

Hamilton Nolan · 12/05/08 03:16PM

We hear that Outside's "upscale travel and style magazine" GO has laid off several staffers, and may be planning to fold after a couple more issues. If you have any info on this or any other candidates for the Great Magazine Die-Off, email us. UPDATE: The magazine's PR person emailed us a press release from two weeks ago saying the magazine is cutting back to two issues next year. There you go!

InTouch Christmas Party Dilemma: Pay to Bring Your Spouse or Cheat for Free?

Richard Lawson · 11/25/08 04:09PM

We stand corrected! Not everyone is canceling their Christmas parties. Magazine publishing biggie Bauer (InTouch, Life & Style) is having a "Bauer on Broadway" Christmas party in Weehawken, where you can perform your favorite showtune with a live band! The only drawback? It costs a whopping $170 to bring a spouse or significant other (or, you know, drunken friend) to the shinding. Which is funny because, as a tipster puts it, that kind of "encourages infidelity." If it's too expensive to bring a date, then you'll be at a dateless party with a bunch of your sloshy coworkers and, well, workplace awkwardness can happen. Though it is in New Jersey, and getting extramarital nookie across state lines isn't really cheating anyway. See the full invite below.

Felix Dennis Counts His Money As His Old Company Crumbles

Hamilton Nolan · 11/24/08 11:06AM

Wild-haired and possibly murderous publisher Felix Dennis sold Alpha Media—home of Maxim and Blender—to a private equity group last year for about $250 million. Now, hey look, Alpha Media may have to be turned over to its creditors because, you know, advertising revenues are down thanks to the economy. The company is currently "in restructuring talks." So Felix Dennis has a quarter of a billion dollars, and the finance whizzes who paid him have cornered the market on Tila Tequila covers. Felix Dennis is smart. [Folio]

Liveblogging the Layoffs: Modern Luxury ... Salon.com ... Life & Style

Gabriel Snyder · 11/21/08 11:14AM

Media layoffs are becoming so frequent, and our email inboxes are getting so overloaded with tips about firings, that we figure that we might as well start a daily liveblog on the topic. Know about layoffs hitting a media company? Post it in the comments below. We'll be updating this post as new reports come in. So far today, we've heard the Life&Style marketing staff got whacked yesterday and that Source Interlink, publisher of Motor Trend and Soap Opera Digest is rumored to be cutting 150 jobs ... Sadly, we're expecting more to come. [For the squeamish you can always email us at tips@gawker.com (but not from your work account, kids!) or call our tip line at 646-214-8138.]

Conde Nast Folds DNR

Hamilton Nolan · 11/20/08 05:24PM

Time Europe Gutted

Ryan Tate · 11/19/08 10:53PM

We've heard from two sources that the London headquarters of Time Europe laid off just under 20 of the nearly 30 editorial staff, including, one said, Time Europe editor William Green and writer senior editor James Graff. Elsewhere, bureau chiefs Andrew Purvis in Berlin and Tim McGirk in Jerusalem are said to be gone after their contracts expire. This has stoked more speculation that the magazine might mimic Newsweek and consolidate to a single international edition — and that London is merely the first in a rolling series of global Thursday layoffs:

Cottage Living Folds

Hamilton Nolan · 11/18/08 05:51PM

You'd think that in these hard times more people would be scaling down to cottages, but no. Time Inc. just announced to its staff that Cottage Living—which had a rate base of 1 million(!)—is folding. The website will also die. According to an internal memo, "the economy inhibited its ability to grow and therefore, sadly, we had to make the decision to close it." Sad for cottage-livers. More sad for the apartment-living employees.

Layoffs at Lucky

Sheila · 11/18/08 04:17PM

Lucky, Conde Nast's magazine about, um, shopping, has laid off three editors. [Portfolio]

Times Keeps Financial Hope Alive

Hamilton Nolan · 11/18/08 10:01AM

The New York Times folded Play magazine yesterday, which actually had good editorial content but bad business prospects, because many of its advertisers were auto companies, and they are all crumbling and taking the media along with them. On the plus side, the NYT business section actually hired somebody yesterday! (David Segal, from the Washington Post). The paper's special magic investment fund dedicated to Biz section hiring is obviously paying off. At least the good editorial=weak advertising equation has a flipside: the vapid T fashion mag lives!:

Layoffs At Redbook

Hamilton Nolan · 11/05/08 05:15PM

We hear that as many as eight editorial employees—ranging from senior editors to editorial assistants—got laid off from Redbook today as part of the broader Hearst layoffs we told you about earlier. "The economy" was the stated reason. If you know more about layoffs at Hearst, email us.

Portfolio Victims Learning Their Fate

Gabriel Snyder · 10/31/08 12:25PM

We hear that this morning Joanne Lipmann notified the unlucky Portfolio staffers who will be losing their jobs as part of Conde Nast's cost cuts and the top of the masthead was hit hard: four of the magazine's seven senior editors have been ushered out. If you know names, please let us know. An email is also supposedly going out to the staff later today with management spin on the cuts.