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Topic: Miscellaneous items
Date/Time: 3/26/2007 11:04:15 AM
Title: Time Inc. folds Life magazine
Posted By: Jim Romenesko
 
News release

TIME INC. TO CLOSE LIFE MAGAZINE NEWSPAPER SUPPLEMENT

---
LIFE TO LAUNCH MASSIVE PHOTOGRAPHIC PORTAL

Collection Contains 10 Million Photos; 97% Have Never Been Seen

(New York, NY March 26, 2007) – Time Inc. announced today that it will close LIFE magazine, but the company will continue to develop LIFE online and operate the brand's other successful businesses. The issue dated April 20, 2007 will be the magazine's last.

While consumers responded enthusiastically to LIFE, with the decline in the newspaper business, and the outlook for advertising growth in the newspaper supplement category, the response was not strong enough to warrant further investment in LIFE as a weekly newspaper supplement.

"LIFE magazine was a truly innovative publishing venture. It was developed, edited and published by some of the best talent in the business and we can remain proud of its many achievements. But sometimes we have to make tough calls, and this was one," said Time Inc. Chairman, CEO Ann Moore. "Growth requires taking risks and the potential upside was huge, but unfortunately the timing worked against us. The market has moved dramatically since October 2004 and it is no longer appropriate to continue publication of LIFE as a newspaper supplement. However, Time Inc. remains committed to the LIFE brand, and we will now be concentrating on migrating this iconic brand in many innovative ways on multiple digital platforms."

Since its launch as a weekly newspaper supplement in October 2004, LIFE carried over 800 ad pages totaling almost $270 million in PIB revenue. LIFE has brought in 140 advertising brands which ran 220 pages that were exclusive to LIFE within the supplement category. LIFE was carried in 103 newspapers across the country with a total circulation of 13 million.

LIFE will continue with its plan to launch a major portal to put its entire collection of 10 million images online. The most important collection of imagery covering the events and the people of the 20th century will be made available to the public for personal use at no cost. More than 97% of this collection has never been seen by the public and contains the works of such master photographers as Alfred Eisenstaedt, Margaret Bourke-White and Gordon Parks, among others. LIFE’s online site, to be launched later this year, will become the preeminent destination to view the most important photography of our time, both archival and contemporary.

LIFE will continue to publish hard and soft cover books filled with the great photography and writing that has made LIFE an American institution. The second LIFE Picture Puzzle book (a sequel to the # 1 New York Times Best Seller), based on the popular back-page of LIFE magazine, will be on newsstands April 2 and in bookstores nationwide on April 17. Two more books are in the works for 2007.

LIFE is one of the publishing world’s most iconic and well-known brands. The magazine was first published by Time Inc. as a weekly in 1936. It ceased publication in 1972, and returned as a monthly from 1978 – 2000.

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