Entertainment Weekly is safe. Time Warner’s planned sale of many magazines to mostly moribund Meredith Publishing is kaput. Time Warner announced today they are spinning all their mags off into a new company called Time Inc. Magazines that would have gone to Meredith in the sale– People, EW, InStyle, etc– won’t be leaving. When the Meredith folks finally got a look at the way InStyle conducts itself, they probably went to bed for a week.
EW might not have lived through the transition, so that’s the most important reason it’s good news the deal didn’t happen. I’ve had loads of friends at Meredith magazines over the years. When they leave, it’s always considered an escape. It would have been hard to imagine the Iowans caucusing around EW or People type Hollywood parties.
I’m not sure that any Kardashians have been featured in Ladies Home Journal. It’s actually hard to imagine any modern women receiving a magazine called Ladies Home Journal in 2013. And let’s not forget More, which may still be coming out every month. But there you are. Time Inc. remains an important part of the journo world, old school style. Except for maybe InStyle. But Time, Fortune SI, EW, People– it would be a harsher world without them.
The new company will be publicly traded. And un popular as hell chief Laura Lang is out. That’s a real defeat for the new order. Maybe John Huey will come back.
