• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, September 7, 2007

The closing of Business 2.0 by Time Inc., announced Tuesday of this week, has added another body to the already substantial pile of print magazines axed this year. As fall begins, Mag Bag would like to remember the fallen with an expired print magazine roll of honor.

The young perished first. In February, MTV Networks gave Nick. Jr. Family Magazine the chop, with the last issue coming in April. The news followed a grueling 2006, when the title saw ad pages plummet 19.4% compared to 2005, to 413, according to the Publishers Information Bureau. Then, in March, Meredith closed Child's print edition, saying it planned to fold the brand into its online parenting destination--a hub that also includes content from American Baby, Family Circle and Parents. In 2006, Child's ad pages had fallen 15.2%. Shortly after Child folded, Time Inc. announced that Life had expired. The venerable magazine, which stopped publishing in weekly format for the first time in 1972, had been reinvented as a weekly newspaper supplement in 2004. While there are no plans for an online edition, Time Inc. said it would be making Life's huge archive of 20th-century photography available online, giving the title a kind of Internet afterlife.

Also in March, the axe fell on Hachette Filipacchi's Premiere, whose last print edition appeared in April. The print edition had tanked in 2006, compared to 2005, with ad pages tumbling 24.7% to 487. However, the magazine's Web site lives on, introducing forums and community areas for celebrity and movie fan clubs.

July saw the demise of Jane, with publisher Conde Nast saying the magazine's August edition would be its last. Founded by Jane Pratt in 1997, the title picked up the second-wave feminist editorial mission of Sassy, another Pratt creation that folded in 1994. But in 2002, publisher Fairchild publications merged with Conde Nast, and in 2005, Pratt resigned as the magazine's publisher, replaced by Carlos LaMadrid. In 2006, ad pages tumbled 20% compared to 2005, leading many to question whether the magazine could survive without its namesake founder. The answer was no.

Men's magazines were no safer. Shortly after the purchase of Maxim, Stuff and Blender by the Quadrangle Group, in a deal led by Kent Brownridge, the new owners announced in August that Stuff would cease publishing as an independent magazine by the end of the year. Stuff-branded editorial content will henceforth appear as a special section in Maxim. From a high of 1,223 and 756 ad pages in 2002, respectively, Maxim and Stuff steadily eroded through 2006, when Maxim reported just 930 pages and Stuff 615. These declines, and the folding of down-market competitor FHM in December 2006, spurred speculation that the young men's market is over-saturated.

One magazine didn't even make it to the newsstand before it got the axe: Bauer Publishing's Cocktail, a much-ballyhooed lifestyle and gossip magazine targeting the same women who read Bauer's In Touch Weekly. In a bizarre turn of events, Cocktail was canceled on the day many staffers first showed up for work.

MPA Honors Kliger, Brown

The Magazine Publishers of America (MPA) and American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME) announced that they are honoring two well-known execs with Lifetime Achievement Awards. Jack Kliger, president and CEO of Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S., Inc., received the MPA's Henry Johnson Fisher Award. The award is named in honor of Henry Johnson Fisher, the founding publisher of Popular Science. Tina Brown, former editor of The New Yorker and Vanity Fair, is being inducted into the ASME Magazine Editors' Hall of Fame. Both awards are scheduled to be presented at a lunch on Wednesday, January 30, 2008, at Gotham Hall in New York City.

Elle Goes Mobile with Fashion Week Coverage

Elle hooked up with Yahoo to make its coverage of New York City's fashion week available to mobile devices. Users who texted the word "fashion" to Yahoo received back links to all of Elle's continuing coverage of the high-profile event, including runway shows and parties with celebrities, models and designers. Content includes editors' reviews, photo essays, and blogs. The same content is also available on Elle's mobile Web site.

CosmoGirl Launches Mini-Soap, Readers Can Star

CosmoGirl is partnering with Raw Digital to create an online soap opera, with an invitation to readers to audition for a starring role. The high-school melodrama, delivered in 3-4 minute "Webisodes," will have one spot available for a dedicated CosmoGirl reader. The series will be available online at Cosmogirl.com, with new episodes appearing three times a week for five weeks.

Discovery Communications has named Joshua Freeman, formerly of AOL, its new executive vice president for digital media. Freeman will be responsible for new technology and strategic alliances and developing new business models and markets. At AOL, Freeman was senior vice president of operations and planning, where he led business operations for a division with over 1,500 employees.