The Reaper is putting down its joystick to just make a note to my faithful readers: in England, Future Publishing just closed down PlayStation World magazine because of "decreasing demand."
"Decreasing demand" is definitely an understatement. In July, U.S. videogame sales fell for the fifth straight month, down a whopping 29% from a year ago. Do the games really suck now or does nobody have the money to blow in this economy?
So we look to Future's PlayStation magazine here, ingeniously called, cough, PlayStation The Official Magazine. It sounds like they can't do anything without Sony's permission. Maybe there will be a mercy clause?
Yah man. Every time I plant a seed, he said kill it before it grows.
SEED (don't you love those magazine titles in all capital letters?) is one of those "Final Destination" titles which have somehow amazingly and luckily escaped death, but death eventually comes around to extract it from the living.
Started by Canadian science boy whiz Adam Bly started the "Vanity Fair of science," the magazine that put the sizzle back in science (!) and somehow has kept it levitated for several years. Of course it has looked nice and won some awards, but you know what that means when it comes to making money. Nada!
So it is no surprise that The Reaper received this letter from a faithful reader: "I just got an email directly from SEED magazine saying that they have
not mailed the August issue, and that they do not know when it will be
mailed. It is 'delayed.' I nominate SEED for the death pool."
While you are all becoming makeshift McKinsey consultants on determining which mags will kick it at Conde Nast, the Wall Street Journal decided to play the same game, except focus just on the food magazines.
They call it a "food fight." They compare the two flailing titles side by side, by the numbers.
Kudos to the redundancy department for taking care of Southern Accents magazine today. For Time Inc., it has all come down to Southern Living and Coastal Living. Frankly, there's not much "living" going on in Birmingham, Alabama.
It's bad enough to be a shelter magazine these days, but a shelter magazine in the south?
I wish they'd come up with a new magazine to help me redecorate the old cave down here. Something perhaps called "Not Living?"
As one of the Reaper's fatherful readers said in his e-mail: "Y'all stay dead now, heah?"
Beware of one-worded women's magazine's based on thin concepts. Tango thought it would survive on relationships, but as everybody knows, love stinks and hook-ups don't last. Pffttt -- Tango moved online only.
Pink, a women's career leadership and busiess title, was not going to be long for this world, despite the noble mission of "equity and opportunity." Waltzing with Tango now in the digital world after five years in print, there is now one less title in nail salons across this great country of ours. Sniff.
You know the Reaper loves games and here's a new one for all you management consultant wannabe's.
It's no secret that Conde Nast has retained McKinsey & Company to "rethink" how it does its business.
So let's pretend you are the lead consultant on the job, kicking the tires around Si's publishing empire, looking for efficiencies and as Charlie Daniels once said, "a soul to steal."
Which magazine would you fold first? Not because you don't like it but because you think it is truly dying and does not deserve to live or the future will be, ahem, unkind or it has outlived its purpose. And why would you fold it?
Here is the line-up of troubled favorites:
W
Allure
Self
Glamour
Teen Vogue
Details
Architectural Digest
Brides
Modern Bride
Elegant Bride
Lucky
Vanity Fair
Gourmet
Bon Appetit
Conde Nast Traveler
Wired
The New Yorker
NOTE: I purposefully left off Vogue, GQ and Cookie since the odds of them folding compared to the others is much slimmer.
After showing some of the fine first half 2009 ad page number drops for a dozen publications, the Reaper's readers had candidates of their own to nominate for the Fix on the River Styx.
No better way to kill a 108-year-old magazine than put somebody who is about that age on your cover.
In 1901, Theodore Roosevelt was just elected president. Only 14% of the homes in the US had bathtubs. There were only 45 states in the US. The average wage was 22 cents an hour. Who was buying all the jewelry that forced somebody to publish a magazine about it?
Brutally murdered after a mere 11 issues, CSI magazine -- the official magazine of the hit CBS tv series -- won't even live on in rerun heaven.
No more will we have tributes to Gil Grissom, features about the hot looking women who populate Miami, Las Vegas and New York, or guides to each precious episode.
If anybody wants to know where the body went, it went with the Reaper on a speedboat to hell!
