Time (stylized in all caps as TIME) is an American news magazine based in New York City. It was published Weekly newspaper for nearly a century. Starting in March 2020, it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on March 3, 1923, and for many years it was run by its influential co-founder, Henry Luce.
A European edition ( Time Europe, formerly known as Time Atlantic) is published in London and also covers the Middle East, Africa, and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition ( Time Asia) is based in Hong Kong. The South Pacific edition, which covers Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific Islands, is based in Sydney.
Since 2018, Time has been owned by Salesforce founder Marc Benioff, who acquired it from Meredith Corporation. Benioff currently publishes the magazine through the company Time USA, LLC.
Time set out to tell the news through people, and until the late 1960s, the magazine's cover depicted a single person. More recently, Time has incorporated "People of the Year" issues, which have grown in popularity over the years. The first issue of Time featured Joseph G. Cannon, the retired Speaker of the House of Representatives, on its cover; a facsimile reprint of Issue No. 1, including all of the articles and advertisements contained in the original, was included with copies of the magazine's issue from February 28, 1938, in commemoration of its 15th anniversary. The cover price was 15¢ (equivalent to $ in ).
Following Hadden's death in 1929, Luce became the dominant man at Time and a significant figure in the history of 20th-century media. According to Time Inc.: The Intimate History of a Publishing Enterprise 1923–1941 by Robert Elson, "Roy Edward Larsen ... was to play a role second only to Luce's in the development of Time Inc". In his book The March of Time, 1935–1951, Raymond Fielding also noted that Larsen was "originally circulation manager and then general manager of Time, later publisher of Life, for many years president of Time Inc., and in the long history of the corporation the most influential and important figure after Luce".
Around the time, they were raising $100,000 from wealthy Yale University alumni, including Henry P. Davison, partner of J.P. Morgan & Co., publicity man Martin Egan and J.P. Morgan & Co. banker Dwight Morrow; Henry Luce and Briton Hadden hired Larsen in 1922. Larsen was a Harvard University graduate, and Luce and Hadden were Yale graduates. After Hadden died in 1929, Larsen purchased 550 shares of Time Inc., using money he obtained from selling RKO Pictures stock he had inherited from his father, who was the head of the Benjamin Franklin Keith theater chain in New England. However, after Briton Hadden's death, the largest Time, Inc. stockholder was Henry Luce, who ruled the media conglomerate in an autocratic fashion; "at his right hand was Larsen", Time Inc.'s second-largest stockholder, according to Time Inc.: The Intimate History of a Publishing Enterprise 1923–1941. In 1929, Roy Larsen was also named a Time Inc. director and vice president. J. P. Morgan retained a certain control through two directorates and a share of stocks, both over Time and Fortune. Other shareholders were Brown Brothers Harriman & Co., and the New York Trust Company (Standard Oil).
After Time began publishing weekly in March 1923, Roy Larsen increased its circulation by using U.S. radio and movie theaters worldwide. It often promoted both Time magazine and U.S. political and corporate interests. According to The March of Time, as early as 1924, Larsen had brought Time into the infant radio business by broadcasting a 15-minute sustaining quiz show entitled Pop Question which survived until 1925. Then in 1928, Larsen "undertook the weekly broadcast of a 10-minute programme series of brief news summaries, drawn from current issues of Time magazine ... which was originally broadcast over 33 stations throughout the United States".
Larsen next arranged for the 30-minute radio program The March of Time to be broadcast over CBS beginning on March 6, 1931. Each week, the program presented a dramatization of the week's news for its listeners; thus Time magazine itself was brought "to the attention of millions previously unaware of its existence", according to Time Inc.: The Intimate History of a Publishing Enterprise 1923–1941, leading to increased circulation during the 1930s. Between 1931 and 1937, Larsen's The March of Time radio program was broadcast over CBS radio, and between 1937 and 1945, it was broadcast over NBC radio – except between 1939 and 1941, when it was not aired. People magazine was based on Time "People" page.
Time Inc. stock owned by Luce at the time of his death was worth about $109 million , and it had been yielding him a yearly dividend of more than $2.4 million , according to Curtis Prendergast's The World of Time Inc.: The Intimate History of a Changing Enterprise 1960-1980. The Larsen family's Time Inc. stock was worth around $80 million during the 1960s. Roy Larsen was both a Time Inc. director and the chairman of its executive committee, later serving as Time Inc.'s board's vice chairman until the middle of 1979. On September 10, 1979, The New York Times wrote, "Mr. Larsen was the only employee in the company's history given an exemption from its policy of mandatory retirement at age 65."
In 1987, Jason McManus succeeded Henry Grunwald as editor-in-chief, and oversaw the transition before Norman Pearlstine succeeded him in 1995.
In 1989, when Time, Inc. and Warner Communications merged, Time became part of Time Warner, along with Warner Bros.
In 2007, Time moved from a Monday subscription/newsstand delivery to a schedule where the magazine goes on sale Fridays and is delivered to subscribers on Saturday. The magazine was published on Fridays when it began in 1923.
In early 2007, the year's first issue was delayed roughly a week due to "editorial changes", including the layoff of 49 employees.
In 2009, Time announced it was introducing Mine, a personalized print magazine mixing content from various Time Warner publications based on the reader's preferences. The new magazine was met with a poor reception, with criticism that its focus needed to be more broad to be truly personal.
The magazine has an online archive with the unformatted text for every article published. The articles were indexed and converted from scanned images using optical character recognition technology. The minor errors in the text are remnants of the conversion to the digital format.
In January 2013, Time Inc. announced that it would cut nearly 500 jobs – roughly 6% of its 8,000 staff worldwide.
Although Time magazine has maintained high sales, its ad pages have declined significantly.
Also in January 2013, Time Inc. named Martha Nelson as the first female editor-in-chief of its magazine division. In September 2013, Nancy Gibbs was named as the first female managing editor of Time magazine.
In November 2017, Meredith Corporation announced its acquisition of Time, Inc., backed by Koch brothers.
In 2017, editor and journalist Catherine Mayer, who also founded the Women's Equality Party in the UK, sued Time through attorney Ann Olivarius for sex and age discrimination. Mayer v. Time, Inc, No. 1:2017cv05613 The suit was resolved in 2018.
In March 2018, only six weeks after the closure of the sale, Meredith announced that it would explore the sale of Time and sister magazines Fortune, Money and Sports Illustrated, since they did not align with the company's lifestyle brands.
In October 2018, Meredith Corporation sold Time to Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne for $190 million. Benioff is the chairman and co-CEO of Salesforce.com, Time is to remain separate from that company, with Benioff not involved in the magazine's daily operations..
Forbes COO Jessica Sibley was appointed CEO of Time in November 2022.
In late April 2023, Time announced the elimination of the website's paywall effective June 1, 2023.
circulation has been steadily declining.
During the second half of 2009, the magazine had a 34.9% decline in newsstand sales. During the first half of 2010, there was another decline of 30%.
In 2012 it had a circulation of 3.3 million, making it the 11th-most circulated magazine in the United States, and the second-most circulated weekly behind People. In July 2017, its circulation was 3,028,013. In October 2017, Time circulation dropped to two million. In early 2023 Time had 1.3 million print subscribers and 250,000 digital subscribers. Combined print and digital circulation was 1 million for the six months to 31 December 2024, down 7.1% year-on-year.
Former president Richard Nixon has been among the most frequently featured on the cover of Time, having appeared 55 times from August 25, 1952, to May 2, 1994.
In October 2020, the magazine replaced its logo with the word "Vote", explaining that "Few events will shape the world to come more than the result of the upcoming US presidential election".
In 2006, Person of the Year was "You", and was met with split reviews. Some thought the concept was creative; others wanted an actual person of the year. Editors Pepper and Timmer reflected that, if it had been a mistake, "we're only going to make it once".
In 2017, Time named the "Silence Breakers", people who came forward with personal stories of sexual harassment, as Person of the Year.
The magazine also compiled "All-Time 100 best novels" and "All-Time 100 Movies" lists in 2005, "The 100 Best TV Shows of All-Time" in 2007, and "All-Time 100 Fashion Icons" in 2012.
In February 2016, Time mistakenly included the male author Evelyn Waugh on its "100 Most Read Female Writers in College Classes" list (he was 97th on the list). The error created much media attention and concerns about the level of basic education among the magazine's staff. Time later issued a retraction. In a BBC interview with Justin Webb, Professor Valentine Cunningham of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, described the mistake as "a piece of profound ignorance on the part of Time magazine".
In December 2008, Time discontinued publishing a Canadian edition.
William Saroyan (1908–1981) lists the full Time editorial department in the 1940 play Love's Old Sweet Song.
Style
Writing
Sections
Milestones
Died. Lieut, (j.g.) David Browning, 24, star of the 1952 Olympics as the U.S.'s dazzling three-meter diving champion, national collegiate one-and three-meter diving champ (1951–52); in the crash of a North American FJ-3 Fury jet fighter while on a training flight; near Rantoul, Kans.
A reader wrote a parody of the older form to announce the change:Betsy Tremont, Letter to the Editor, in "A Letter from the Publisher". Time. "October 13, 1967". [9].
Died. Time's delightful but confusing habit of listing names, ages, claims to fame, and other interesting tidbits about the famous newly deceased in its Milestones notices; then the circumstances of, and places where, the deaths occurred; of apparent good sentence structure; in New York.
Listings
Cover
2007 redesign
Special editions
Person of the Year
Time 100
X covers
Cover logo replaced by "Vote" logo
Spin-offs
Time for Kids
Time Canada
Time LightBox
TimePieces NFTs
Staff
Editors
Managing editors
John S. Martin 1929 1937 Manfred Gottfried 1937 1943 T. S. Matthews 1943 1949 Roy Alexander 1949 1960 Otto Fuerbringer 1960 1968 Henry Grunwald 1968 1977 Ray Cave 1979 1985 Jason McManus 1985 1987 Henry Muller 1987 1993 James R. Gaines 1993 1995 Walter Isaacson 1996 2001 Jim Kelly 2001 2005 Richard Stengel 2006 2013 Nancy Gibbs 2013 2017 Edward Felsenthal 2017 2023 Sam Jacobs 2023 present
Notable contributors
Competitors in the U.S.
See also
Further reading
External links
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