Features

Tech magazine’s assets sold for $1.4 million

Associated Press
Tuesday September 25, 2001

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The bankrupt Industry Standard sold the subscriber lists and other assets of its once-thriving technology magazine for $1.4 million in a court-supervised auction Monday. 

Media giant AOL Time Warner, which publishes the rival technology magazine Business 2.0, bought the Standard’s paid subscriber list and liabilities for unfulfilled subscriptions for $500,000. 

The Standard’s majority owner, the International Data Group, will pay $900,000 for the lists of readers who received free copies of the magazine or electronic newsletters through e-mail. 

In an internal memo to its employees, IDG disclosed that it has no plans to revive the Industry Standard in the United States. After abruptly closing last month, the Standard held out hope that it might return to newsstands under another owner. 

Before the past year’s high-tech slump dried up the magazine’s advertising support, the Industry Standard cashed in on the dot-com boom in the Silicon Valley. The San Francisco-based magazine and its operations generated $140 million in revenue last year, but suffered a 70 percent drop-off in business this year. 

——— 

On The Net: 

http://www.industrystandard.com