RIP Business 2.0
Business 2.0, one of the last survivors of the original bubble-era “new economy” magazines, announced today it will close its doors. Its final issue will hit newsstands later this month.
Rumors and speculation of this day have swirled throughout the blogosphere over the past couple months, enough to start a Facebook group — an Internet era petition of sorts — that swelled with users showing support (see previous post).
For a second, it looked like this would help, but falling ad revenues (34 percent decrease in ad pages during the first six months of ’07) ultimately forced B20’s parent, Time Inc., to pull the plug. In some ways this represents some of the woes facing print journalism overall, as readers flock to online sources and advertisers follow.
It is also a sad day, symbolic of the death of the class of magazines originally founded to characterize the bubble-era tech and business environment (for better or worse). Few of these, including B20, lived on to report the ensuing bloodletting and subsequent second wave of decidedly more pragmatic innovation and investment (though not without its share of over valuation).
Those in this class that fell long before B20 include Industry Standard, Red Herring (original iteration), ForbesASAP and Upside (some of which, I’ve worked for). Time will meanwhile transition editor Josh Quittner and 10 others to its flagship business mag, Fortune. We wish the best to the rest of the B20 staffers and anyone affected by this event.
