Time To Stop Publishing Life Magazine, Will Keep It Online

Magazine publisher Time Inc. is shutting down Life magazine again, a brand it had resuscitated in late 2004 as a newspaper supplement.

Time said in a statement Monday that it would keep the Life brand going on the Internet, where it will launch a Web site with photos from its massive image collection, and by publishing books.

The company cited the "decline in the newspaper business" and poor advertising outlook as factors in its decision.

Life had been carried in 103 newspapers, and competed in the Sunday newspaper supplement business with Parade, owned by Advance Publications, and Gannett's USA Weekend. American Profile, a privately held supplement, targets smaller newspapers.

April 20 will be LIFE's last print issue, Time, a unit of Time Warner

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It is the latest magazine to shut down as more readers desert print publications for online news and photos.

"Growth requires taking risks and the potential upside was huge, but unfortunately the timing worked against us," Time Inc. Chief Executive Ann Moore said. "The market has moved dramatically since October 2004 and it is no longer appropriate to continue publication of LIFE as a newspaper supplement."

Time Inc. has now shut down Life magazine three times.

Originally launched in 1936 as a weekly, Life was suspended from regular publication in 1972 and brought back as a monthly in 1978. It was suspended again in 2000, then brought back as a newspaper supplement in 2004.

Time will make LIFE's collection of 10 million images available online, with "the most important collection of imagery covering the events and people of the 20th century" available for free for personal use, it said.

More than 97% of the collection has never been seen by the public, Time said, and includes pictures by Alfred Eisenstaedt, Margaret Bourke-White and Gordon Parks.

The announcement comes after the company launched a redesigned version of its U.S. newsweekly Time. Earlier this year, it said 289 jobs would be cut from its estimated 11,300 work force to lower costs as it invests more in the Internet.