After 151 years, Popular Science will no longer offer a magazine
The long-running publication has come to an end.
There is a discussion on Hacker News, but feel free to comment here as well.
RIP
Is the company by any chance heavily shorted on the stock market?
This is the best summary I could come up with:
In a statement to The Verge, Cathy Hebert, the communications director for PopSci owner Recurrent Ventures, says the outlet needs to “evolve” beyond its magazine product, which published its first all-digital issue in 2021.
In a post on LinkedIn, former PopSci editor Purbita Saha commented on the magazine’s discontinuation, stating she’s “frustrated, incensed, and appalled that the owners shut down a pioneering publication that’s adapted to 151 years worth of changes in the space of a five-minute Zoom call.” Layoffs have impacted journalists on the science beat particularly hard in recent weeks.
“PopSci is a phenomenal brand, and as consumer trends shift it’s important we prioritize investment in new formats,” Herbert tells The Verge.
In addition to dropping its magazine format, PopSci laid off several employees earlier this month, leaving around five editorial staff members and “a few” workers on the publication’s commerce team, according to Axios.
The digital media group Recurrent Ventures acquired PopSci in 2021 and named its third CEO in three years just one week before the layoffs hit.
However, its discontinuation marks the end of an era, and the other cuts across the science journalism field won’t make it easier to stay up to date on the state of our climate or dive into fascinating stories that you might not otherwise come across without the media outlets that bring them to our attention.
The original article contains 384 words, the summary contains 227 words. Saved 41%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
