REBIRTH, OR SLOW, PAINFUL DECLINE?  – AT 8:55 A.M. ET:  A development in the news media may, or may not, be a guideline for the future.  From The New York Times:

Tina Brown is back in the world of print.

After a brief and interrupted dalliance, Newsweek, the 77-year-old magazine, and The Daily Beast, Ms. Brown’s two-year-old Web site, have decided to put their cultural differences aside and will join forces.

Ms. Brown confirmed the deal in a column posted Thursday night in which she said the agreement was finalized with a coffee mug toast Tuesday evening. “As for me, I shall now be in the editor-in-chief’s chair at both The Daily Beast and Newsweek,” she wrote.

And...

Newsweek, bled by an exodus of staff members, a rapidly declining readership and a flight of advertisers, is a shell of what it used to be: a member of the small prestigious club of weekly magazines that helped set the tone for news coverage.

And...

The deal to bring Ms. Brown on board will probably be seen as a test of whether both Newsweek and Ms. Brown can reclaim their former glory in the print galaxy.

Ms. Brown appears to believe at least part of that is true. She said early Thursday morning she hoped The Daliy Beast would help “power the resurgence of Newsweek.”

COMMENT:  Having come from journalism, I hate to see publications die.  But I'm afraid Newsweek is probably a goner, with TIME not far behind.  LIFE died because the picture magazine had become obsolete with the advent of color television and satellite news coverage.  The weekly newsmagazine has no vital role, with so much available on the internet. 

In addition, Newsweek started to tilt so far to the left that it lost credibility and a number of subscribers, including me.

Publications without a clear purpose can sometimes thrive at a times of great drama, like World War II, when almost anything about the war was gobbled up.  That situation does not prevail today.

While Tina Brown has had an illustrious career, the internet has its own set of stars, and it's almost unfair to expect her to make a hit when she now has hundreds of thousands of competitors.

The merger is an interesting idea.  We wish the team well, but we have our doubts.

November 12, 2010