Ziff Davis is closing its

ExtremeTech is changing. The current staff: writers Jason Cross and Joel Durham, producers Jeremy Atkinson and Mike Nguyen, our enthusiastic forum moderator, Jim Lynch, plus your truly, will be leaving Ziff-Davis at the end of this week. Executive Editor Jeremy Kaplan (former editor of ExtremeTech Magazine) will take over management and editorial direction for the site.

That means this is the last Notes from the Basement column, at least, the last one hosted by Ziff-Davis. So be warned: this column may be long-not because these are all my words.

Viacom's Nickelodeon network is

"As I am sure everyone knows, the magazine publishing industry as a whole is severely challenged, and because of that, we have decided to exit the magazine business and will cease publishing them by the end of this year," said Cyma Zarghami, president of Nickelodeon/MTVN Kids and Family Group said in an internal memo, according to Mediaweek.

CMT.com

Radio & Records, a major music industry trade publication founded in 1973, and Performing Songwriter, a Nashville-based magazine established in 1993, are closing, their owners announced Wednesday (June 3). Both covered a wide variety of musical genres, including country, and attributed the closures to the current economic climate. R&R, headquartered in Los Angeles, was acquired in 2006 by VNU, a company that also owned the predominant music trade magazine, Billboard, as well as the Hollywood Reporter and ACNielsen. VNU changed its name to the Nielsen Company in 2007.

Beliefnet

According to a plan announced Friday (May 22), two magazines will fold: Today's Christian Woman and the Campus Life College Guide, which targets Christian undergrads. CTI will also cease to publish Glimpses, a worship bulletin insert with stories from Christian history, and Church Office Today, a bi-monthly newsletter read by church administrators.

The moves, which reduce CTI staff numbers by 22 percent to 108 employees, mark the latest attempt to cut costs at Carol Stream, Ill.-based CTI. In January, the organization shuttered two other magazines -- Marriage Partnership and Ignite Your Faith -- and sold a third, Today's Christian.

President and Publisher Harold Smith called the latest actions "necessary."

"We find ourselves -- as does our industry -- in the midst of a perfect publishing storm," Smith said in a written statement. "The impact on employees who are truly gifted -- and the impact on the church as a whole -- is a sobering reality for me and the entire CTI team that remains."

Press Gazette

Writing on the Plan B messageboard, publisher Frances Morgan said: "We've come to the decision to close Plan B Magazine after the June issue after a lot of deliberation.

"The current economic climate, combined with the situation of the music industry - to which, whether we like it or not, the fortunes of a commercial monthly music mag are inextricably linked - has made it ever harder for us to continue producing the magazine the way we want to.

"To keep going, we'd need to make cuts in staff, content, size, frequency, print quality - and we're not prepared to do that. We're still above water, we're making some beautiful magazines, and we are quitting while we're ahead."

Greg Sullivan and Joe Diaz are launching a travel magazine called Afar. The publication will be launched by

AFAR was conceived by Greg Sullivan, a serial international entrepreneur, over a beer on a beach in Goa, India, with business partner Joe Diaz, a former teacher. AFAR is the result of their shared thirst for a different kind of travel resource. "There were no media sources on the market for international travelers who shared our desire for deeper and more authentic experiences," said Sullivan. "AFAR takes travelers beyond the ordinary tourist haunts to experience the authentic essence of a place."

AFAR is helmed by some of the most talented names in the industry, including, as president and publisher, John Sheehy, who was the founding general manager of Time Inc.'s Health magazine, as well as president and publisher of Utne Reader, and COO of Weider Publications. Susan West, former executive editor of Smithsonian and co-founder of Health magazine, will be editor in chief, and Jane Palecek, the founding art director of Health and former design director of Mother Jones, will be art director. Laura Simkins, the founding consumer marketing director of Dwell, will be audience marketing director.

"AFAR's readers are redefining travel as a way to learn, connect and grow," said West. "So we'll tell stories from the inside out, celebrate authenticity and offer the unexpected. Our writers will approach their subjects with the same enthusiastic curiosity that drives our readers."

LAetcetera has a controlled circulation of roughly 480,000 and is being distributed three times per month to newspaper subscribers who don't already receive the monthly publication: LA, Los Angeles Times Magazine. The new magazine seeks to bring readers timely pop culture, shopping, fashion, and home coverage.

• New 'USA Today' Publisher Sees Future Paid Web Content
• Disney Looks Beyond Traditional Studio Model
• The Guardian Looks Into Online Charging Model
• Murdoch on Paid Content: "The Current Days of the Internet Will Soon be Over"
• Media Executives Plan Online Service to Charge for Content

The final print editions for those cities will hit the streets this week.

"It is an unpleasant task to discontinue print in those two cities - and to lay off the good people who worked hard to make them profitable - but I believe it is the wise business decision to make," Chief Executive Officer and President Steve Hannah said in a memo to employees Monday.

Variety

Owner Crain Communications made the announcement on Tuesday, ending months of speculation over the fate of the pub. TV Week will continue as an online-only site, but with a dramatically reduced staff.

TV Week's NewsPro supplement, however, will continue as a stand-alone print publication, distributing issues monthly beginning in August.

Among those departing are editor Greg Baumann, who told Variety that he will assist in the transition through June 1, when TV Week publishes its final print edition. After that, Baumann said he planned to consult and freelance in journalism.

Editor & Publisher

The association trimmed 39 positions this afternoon in response to the downturn in the industry, with 43 staffers remaining. In a memo to employees, President and CEO John Sturm wrote the steps were necessary and were taken at the direction of the board. "To be direct, industry economics compelled this round of staff reductions - to ensure we remain an affordable value to our members," he wrote.

Sturm also said the association is looking to further reduce member dues.

Conde Nast is ceasing publication of its business magazine, Portfolio, effective with its May issue. Portfolio.com will close in the second quarter of the year. Charles H. Townsend, President and CEO of Conde Nast made the announcement.

"The pressures and realities of the continuous deep economic slump have lowered Portfolio's revenue projections below what is needed to continue publication," Mr. Townsend said. "Portfolio was an ambitious and innovative magazine and website, and we were proud to publish them. The challenges facing this launch however proved too great. Joanne Lipman is an extraordinarily skillful editor and William Li is a very talented publisher. We thank them and their staffs for their tremendous efforts. It is unfortunate we were unable to give Portfolio the time needed to fully mature."

Portfolio and Portfolio.com were launched in May 2007. The magazine has published 21 issues since its launch. You can read more about Portfolio's closure

• Yahoo will cut nearly 700 jobs after reporting a weak Q1.
• Media General is cutting 300 jobs.
• The Sun-Times Media Group is cutting jobs in an attempt to cut payroll by 15%.
• The New York Post says Hachette Filipacchi implemented 6& pay cuts for all overtime-exempt employees and 3% cuts on all hourly employees.
• The San Francisco Chronicle is cutting 90 to 100 driver jobs.
• The Chicago Tribune has made cuts - 53 editorial employees have left.
• NPR has cut 13 jobs.
• Disney has cut 1,700 positions at its theme parks.
• Phoenix Media, which publishes the Boston Phoenix, has cut six positions.

Yahoo has

After careful consideration, we have decided to close GeoCities later this year. We'll share more details this summer. For now, please sign in or visit the help center for more information.

Multichannel

Despite a down time for magazines overall, with ad pages declining 26% year over year in the first quarter, Food Network Magazine, which debuted in October 2008, sold 70% of its initial "test issue," which had a rate base (for advertising sale purposes) of 300,000 copies. That sales level was achieved in three weeks on the newsstands, Hearst said, citing multi-platform promotion behind the new magazine.

A second "test issue" came out in January, by which time the publishers had decided to produce six issues overall in 2009.

The New York Times

"We went as far as we could in a difficult environment," said an Alpha Media spokeswoman, Nora Haynes.

About 30 people will leave the company as a result of the magazine's closing, she said.

Alpha also is combining its magazine Maxim with Maxim.com, which means a few staff changes and, potentially, more layoffs. Joe Levy, the editor in chief of Blender, will become editor in chief of the combined Maxim and Maxim.com; Jay Woodruff, formerly editor in chief of Maxim Digital, will become chief content officer of the operation.

Blender has been publishing since 2001, featuring music reviews, recurring features like "greatest songs ever," and articles on Ludacris and Radiohead. It is aimed at young men and its covers have tended to feature female singers, like Fergie and Nicole Scherzinger of the Pussycat Dolls, in come-hither poses.

STARLOG.com has relaunched in beta! As a part of our massive digital initiative, STARLOG.com has returned to the web to bring you the best original content pertaining to the worlds of Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Comic Entertainment.

With daily news, reviews, features, and more, STARLOG.com is your home for sci-fi on the web.

In addition, our new Digital store (launching next month), available on our network of online sites including STARLOG and FANGORIA, will soon feature beautifully restored digital editions of the entire run of STARLOG magazine.

We feel that these new technological ventures are very much in step with the futuristic concept of STARLOG, and will carry the brand forward into the new ideology of the 21st century and beyond.

It is also at this time that we announce the temporary cessation of the current run of STARLOG as a print magazine. After 33 years, and considering the present state of the economy, we feel its time for a major revamp and will be temporarily discontinuing publication while the model and redesign of the magazine are contemplated and executed.

The last print issue available for the time being is #374, while issue #375 will be available exclusively as a digital edition on the network in the very near future.

We're looking forward to bringing you more of the best of sci-fi in the months ahead. Thank you for your continued support and your understanding in this matter.

Time is in good company - most big magazines' subscriptions cost on average little more than a dollar an issue. But now, as they consider the decline in advertising and the success of magazines that have increased prices recently, some publishers are wondering whether they can raise their prices without losing subscribers.

"We're realizing that the product is undervalued," said Michael A. Clinton, the chief marketing officer of Hearst Magazines, which raised cover prices on more than half of its magazines last year and plans to raise subscription prices this year.

Publishers have long set low subscription prices and have even lost money doing so, assuming that the real money came from ads. Subscription revenue was gravy.

In the last six months of 2008, subscribers paid an average of 47 cents an issue for Newsweek, 77 cents an issue for BusinessWeek and 89 cents an issue for Fortune, according to an analysis of their filings with the Audit Bureau of Circulations.

Folio

Renowned content expert Carrie Tuhy, who was instrumental in some of the most successful magazine launches in recent decades-InStyle and Real Simple-has been named editorial director. Tuhy also produced InStyle Celebrity Weddings, in print and on television.

By bringing together writers, illustrators and photographers from around the world, Weddings by The Ritz-Carlton will be a new type of luxury magazine that inspires and delights readers the world-over with insights into the trends and traditions of a signature Ritz-Carlton wedding, as well as elements of designing the ultimate luxury experience, including rings, gowns and ideas for making the celebration and honeymoon unforgettable.

"The guest and advertiser response to a test issue was so strong that McMurry and The Ritz-Carlton have decided to make Weddings by The Ritz-Carlton a permanent, integral part of the media space," said Tracie McLaughlin, Publisher at McMurry, who added that this new channel offers qualified, targeted exposure to high-end weddings. Local and global advertising opportunities are currently available.

The Christian Post

Still, for NavPress, the move to cease the printing operations for their magazines and enhance their web presence was decidedly the best one, though a difficult one.

"This new structure positions us for a long and fruitful ministry through publishing," said Miller in his announcement. "But it means saying goodbye to some outstanding people. That's always the hardest part."

According to NavPress, Navigators staff members were informed of the new developments on Friday, and the publishing division is now communicating details with its authors.

Reuters MediaFile

ForbesWoman on Forbes.com will serve as the premier destination for professional women, with breaking news, prominent voices, regular features, in-depth reports and columns, peer-driven social networking and numerous opportunities for dialogue and interactivity. ForbesWoman content areas include: Leadership, Power Women, Entrepreneurs, Net Worth, Style, Wellbeing and Time. It will also offer a video series, "Smart Women Now," and featured columnists who include Moira Forbes and economist Sylvia Ann Hewlett.

ForbesWoman online launches with a special report entitled "The New Executive Woman," sponsored by Audi, which profiles the modern day female executive. This report includes: "Rule Breakers," a story about how more women are taking greater control of their careers; "Making Money in a Downturn," profiling how women have stayed on top of their game in these challenging economic times; "The Year's Savviest Celebrity Businesswomen," a look at the most successful celebrity businesswomen; "Managing a Family," about how women manage high-powered careers with children; "How She Leads," a study that investigates if women have what it takes to be leaders; and "How She Gets Ahead," which provides networking and management strategies.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has moved entirely to the Internet. The P-I's last print edition was last Tuesday. Now the paper is

But The P-I, as it is called, will resemble a local Huffington Post more than a traditional newspaper, with a news staff of about 20 people rather than the 165 it had, and a site with mostly commentary, advice and links to other news sites, along with some original reporting.

Other newspapers have closed and many more are threatened. But the transition to an all-digital product for The P-I will be especially closely watched in an industry that is fast losing revenue and is casting around for a new economic model.

For one thing, the closing may end up putting greater pressure on the surviving and financially struggling Seattle Times, because of the end of a joint operating agreement between the two papers. It may even bring closer the day when Seattle has no local paper at all.

And the way The P-I is changing might hint at a path for future newspaper closings. To some extent, in shifting its business model, it will enter a new realm of competition. It will compete not just with the print-and-ink Times, but also with an established local news Web site, Crosscut.com, a much smaller nonprofit organization that focuses on the Northwest. The move shows how some newspapers, in the future, may not vanish but move the battle from print to the digital arena.

Hallmark Cards announced today that it will discontinue publishing Hallmark Magazine with the February/March issue now on newsstands. The Hallmarkmagazine.com website also will close. The decision was reached after a comprehensive analysis of the current business and trends facing the magazine publishing industry as a whole, said Donald J. Hall, Jr., Hallmark president and chief executive officer of the privately-held company.

"Despite favorable consumer acceptance of the publication, we can not justify continued investment in the magazine at a time when we must focus our efforts and resources only on those projects that will lead to long-term profitable revenue growth for the company," Hall said.

Min Online

Sandra Lee, host of the Food Network show, Semi-Homemade Cooking with Sandra Lee, has launched her new magazine, Sandra Lee Semi-Homemade. The inaugural issue published by Hoffman Media, focuses on affordable culinary and lifestyle solutions. The premier issue contains over 180 quick and easy recipes and ideas, 20 minute money-saving meals and affordable decorating tips.

The magazine is published in a bimonthly format with the majority of the content geared toward food and entertaining and the remainder focused on home, gardening, crafts and lifestyle in general. Sandra Lee, who takes on the new role of Editor-in-Chief, said, "I am thrilled to embark on this groundbreaking endeavor with Hoffman Media. Sandra Lee Semi-Homemade magazine marries fresh, innovative ideas with brand integration allowing the reader to achieve attainable results while saving time and money, so they can make every day and every meal special."

Hoffman Media also publishes Cooking with Paula Deen. The premier issue of Sandra Lee Semi-Homemade will have a distribution of over 300,000 copies to major newsstand outlets, with a newsstand price of $4.99 and a subscription price of $19.98. The magazine's website can be found at

Portfolio

Could Saturday soon cease to be a Newsday on Long Island? Media appraiser Kevin Kamen thinks it will, predicting that Cablevision will cease publishing a Saturday edition of the paper to save money. "By cutting out a Saturday edition Cablevision could quickly realize a savings across the board, be able to further eliminate editorial and production positions and essentially streamline costs that help their profit margins," he writes.

"I doubt if the Great Depression was as bad," said Steven Cohn, editor in chief of MIN, who has been covering the magazine industry for 22 years.

For the first quarter, the total number of pages came to 26,167, a 22% drop from the same period a year ago.

"Until we see indicators of people going back to stores and restaurants being crowded, this is going to continue," Mr. Cohn said. "People have to start spending money for this to change."

The Wall Street Journal

A spokesman for the newspaper said the cuts were made through a combination of layoffs, buyouts and elimination of job openings. The Journal has about 760 newsroom employees.

The Wall Street Journal is published by Dow Jones & Co., which also publishes this newswire. Dow Jones is owned by News Corp. (NWS), which will report its fiscal second-quarter earnings after the closing bell.

UPI

Realms of Fantasy is ceasing publication. The publication's website

"Dear Readers: We're sorry to report that the April 2009 issue of Realms of Fantasy Magazine will be the last. Thank you very much for your support these many years!"

U.S. News

Domino, which offers advice on decorating, do-it-yourself projects, gardening, and party planning, will publish its final issue in March.

Take a magazine built around peddling products, couple that with a deepening recession in which people are less likely to purchase things, and you've got a recipe for failure. "This decision to cease publication of the magazine and its website is driven entirely by the economy," Townsend said. "Although readership and advertising response was encouraging in the early years, we have concluded that this economic market will not support our business expectations."

Disney is shuttering its Wondertime magazine and folding the

Disney said its U.S. consumer magazine unit would focus its efforts on its bigger parenting title, 2.1-million-circ FamilyFun. March's issue of Wondertime will be the last, and Wondertime.com will be folded into Disney Online's network of family-focused Web sites in May, the company said.

Launched as a quarterly in early 2006, Wondertime offered an alternative to traditional parenting magazines, with a focus on learning and target audience of moms with kids under the age of 6. Wondertime was growing but from a small base. The title's ad pages increased 24 percent to 557 in 2008 versus a 3 percent decline in ad pages for the category overall, per the Mediaweek Monitor. Its rate base was slated to go 650,000 in February, an increase of 30 percent.

Reuters

"The recessionary economy has impacted both publishing and broadcasting advertising, which accounts for approximately 60 percent of our revenue stream," Chief Executive Stephen Lacy said in a statement released on Thursday. "Trends indicate a continuing soft economy into calendar 2009 as well."

Meredith will take a charge of $16 million, which comes out to $9 million after tax, or 20 cents a share, for its fiscal 2009 second quarter.

The charge includes job cuts, the closing of Country Home magazine and moving the ReadyMade brand and Parents.com to its headquarters in Des Moines, Iowa, Meredith said. The publisher also has an office in New York.

Meredith plans to report its second-quarter results on January 22. Analysts on average are expecting earnings of 48 cents a share before charges and other items on revenue of $366.1 million, according to Reuters Estimates.

The recession is driving publishers to make significant changes. A big change was announced today at the New York Times. They have started selling ads on their front page. They reported on themselves in an article

The first such ad, appearing Monday in color, was bought by CBS. The ad, two-and-a-half inches high, lies horizontally across the bottom of the front page, below the news articles and a brief summary of some articles in the paper. In a statement, the paper said such ads would be placed "below the fold" - that is, on the lower half of the page.

In the past, The Times has printed an occasional front-page classified ad - two or three lines of text at the bottom of the page. And a few years ago it began selling display ads - which are much larger and can combine images and text - on the front pages of sections inside the paper.

But The Times did not sell displays on the first page of the first section, a move regarded by traditionalists as a commercial incursion into the most important news space in the paper.

Most major American papers sell front-page display ads, including The Wall Street Journal, USA Today and The Los Angeles Times, but some others, including TheWashington Post, do not.

JPG Magazine

We've spent the last few months trying to make the business behind JPG sustain itself, and we've reached the end of the line. We all deeply believe in everything JPG represents, but just weren't able to raise the money needed to keep JPG alive in these extraordinary economic times. We sought out buyers, spoke with numerous potential investors, and pitched several last-ditch creative efforts, all without success. As a result, jpgmag.com will shut down on Monday, January 5, 2009.

The one thing we've been the most proud of: your amazing talent. We feel honored and humbled to have been able to share jpgmag.com with such a dynamic, warm, and wonderful community of nearly 200,000 photographers. The images on the website and in the magazine were adored by many, leaving no doubt that this community created work of the highest caliber. The kindness, generosity, and support shared among members made it a community in the truest sense of the word, and one that we have loved being a part of for these past two years.

Sovereign/Homestead is launching

Mediaweek

"The Post and the Sun have agreed to share the newspapers' day-to-day coverage of certain Maryland news and sports," the papers said in a joint announcement. "In addition, the Post and the Sun may draw on each other's national, international and feature stories that are distributed by the LAT-WP News Service, to which both contribute. The exchanges will allow each paper to take advantage of the other's strengths and expertise in specific subjects around the region and the world."

Some content won't be shared, the papers said.

"As part of this accord, exclusive stories will not usually be shared, nor will coverage of such competitive subjects as Maryland state government and University of Maryland athletics," they said.

In prepared statements, the rival editors had nothing but praise for each other's paper. The sharing starts Jan. 1.

The 335 new magazines of '08, which tended to be small titles with a narrow focus, was down from 386 in 2007 and 431 in 2006, according to MediaFinder.

And yet, despite an inhospitable environment and the growing power of the Internet, intrepid publishers see a future in print.

"You still get bigger ad dollars from print than from online," said Trish Hagood, president of Oxbridge Communications, owner of MediaFinder. "If publishers can find subjects that truly interest people, then they can find the advertising."

Simon & Schuster cut 35 positions.

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Singular Magazine Targets Happy Single People

Singluar magazine is a new publication that targets affluent unmarried adults. It isn't a dating magazine. It targets people who are satisfied being single. Here's an excerpt from the press release.

Singular magazine, created to serve Los Angeles' fast growing demographic of affluent unmarried adults, has hit regional newsstands and 63,000 households. Along with its companion website SingularCity.com, the magazine delivers an editorial voice that validates what it calls the "singular" lifestyle, recognizing being single as a satisfying, enjoyable lifestyle.

Differentiating itself from other singles-oriented brands, Singular's goal is to position the unmarried status as a positive and fulfilling way-of-life and will embrace and speak to this large, fast-growing, successful group in a way that celebrates their life style rather than trying to "fix it."

Singular magazine is the ultimate "good life" guide for unmarried adults over 30 with household incomes over $100,000. The look of the 140-page glossy premiere issue says sophisticated, sexy and savvy -- as well as friendly, inviting, warm and fun. SingularCity.com offers a virtual community for "singulars" that includes social networking functionality with personal profiles, forums, blogs, special interest groups and a calendar of events and activities.

The publication launched in September and its holiday issue with Amy Sedaris recently hit newsstands and was direct-mailed to 70,000 subscribers.

Elisabeth Eaves at Forbes writers that "Marital status, it seems, does not a target market make." Singles aren't a very organized group and they have wide-ranging interests just like married people. However, the number of people not getting married does seem to be growing and if Singular can get the word out then they might be able to interest some happy-to-be-single unmarrieds in reading their publication.

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Google Hosts Life Photo Archive



Google has launched the Life Photo Archive. It's a collection of Life photos dating back to 1750. The searchable database of Life photos includes many that were never published in the magazine.

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Comedy Central Launches Jokes.com

Comedy Central has launched Jokes.com - Viacom has owned the domain since 2002. CNET reports that the new jokes hub contains 5,000 funny videos and 12,000 text-based jokes.

"Stand-up comedy and comedians have always been the backbone of the network," said Erik Flannigan, executive vice president of digital media at MTV Networks Entertainment Group, the Viacom division that encompasses Comedy Central.

As with other Comedy Central video sites, like The Daily Show and Colbert Nation, the content is ad-supported. This summer, Comedy Central took another acquired property, Atom.com, and turned it into a site for short-form Web comedy.

Since the clips in the video archive are sourced from Comedy Central programming going back to 1997's The A-List, none of them go beyond a late-night-cable level of tawdriness. The text jokes, Flannigan said, can be dirtier.

"We're not trying to make it as dirty as humanly possible, but we're not adhering to the same standards as broadcast," he explained.

It's a good domain name for Comedy Central. It's pretty clear what you are going to find at Jokes.com.

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Michael Wolff Talks Rupert Murdoch

Jon Friedman from Marketwatch talks with Michael Wolff about the movement of news to the Internet and about media mogul Ropert Murdoch. Wolff's recent book is called The Man Who Owns the News: Inside the Secret World of Rupert Murdoch. Wolff calls Murdoch the last great newspaper man. Wolff says Murdoch's views the media world is as an ongoing newspaper war. Wolff thinks Murdoch is now thinking about the Wall Street Journal 90% of the time.



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Black Friday Twitter Tracks Black Friday Ads and News

Twitter.com is a microblogging service that allows users to quickly post short 140-character updates while they are sitting at their computer. Updates can also be posted via email or with a cell phone or other mobile device. The service is also being used increasingly by the media for delivering news and by retail outlets to correspond with customers. A Twitter profile named Black Friday has been set-up that tweet news about the latest Black Friday ads and deals and the latest Black Friday happenings. Black Friday tweets from everyone on Twitter can also be found by using Twitter Search and searching for the test "Black Friday." Black Friday is a big event in the blogging world as bloggers discuss the latest deals - you can find some of the latest blog posts by searching Technorati or Google Blog Search.

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US News and World Report Switching to Monthly

The Associated Press reports that the U.S. News and World Report is going to cut back on the number of issues it publishes. They will be switching to monthly and focus more on the website.

The Washington Post, citing unnamed staffers briefed on the decision, said the magazine's print edition will focus on popular consumer guides such as its annual ranking of colleges, while its Web site will offer expanded features.

U.S. News spokeswoman Liz Putze declined comment to The Associated Press. The magazine is owned by publisher and real estate developer Mortimer B. Zuckerman.

The magazine, which had average circulation of 1.8 million during the first half of the year, announced in June that it planned to change from weekly to biweekly publication.

This news comes not too longer after the Christian Science Monitor announced plans to also move to a monthly print cycle and focus more on its news website.

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