Goodbye World Weekly News

cheerful_deviant

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Apr 4, 2004
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I can't say it ever really enlightened me, but it was certainly entertaining:

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MIAMI (Reuters) - Publisher American Media Inc. said on Tuesday it will stop printing the Weekly World News, which for 28 years gleefully chronicled the exploits of alien babies, animal-human hybrids and dead celebrities.

The company said in a brief statement it would end the print version of the tabloid newspaper next month but would maintain the online version (www.weeklyworldnews.com).

"Due to the challenges in the retail and wholesale magazine marketplace that have impacted the newsstand, American Media, Inc. today announced it will close the print version of the Weekly World News, effective with the August 27 issue. Weekly World News was AMI's smallest weekly publication," the company said in a statement e-mailed to Reuters.

Spokesman Richard Valvo declined further comment.

American Media is headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, and is best known as the publisher of the National Enquirer. The company announced last month it was exploring the sale of five of its 16 magazines as part of a strategy to focus on celebrity weeklies and lifestyle magazines.

The Weekly World News, which boasted it was "The World's Only Reliable Newspaper," reveled in shocking and almost always exclusive reports about extra-terrestrials, ghosts, scoundrels and scientific discoveries, such as the cure for lovesickness found on the walls of an ancient Mexican monument.

Bat Boy, the half-bat, half-human child found in a cave, was a regular feature. After the September 11 attacks, the tabloid reported he had been enlisted in the hunt for Osama bin Laden because of his special cave-dwelling skills.

The current online version reports that Mother Nature has endorsed Al Gore for president and other recent headlines include: "Man bothered by alien telemarketers" and "Dentist uses UFO metal in patient's tooth"

AMI reported a $160 million net loss for 2006 and is struggling with $1 billion of debt and plummeting circulation. It said in an SEC filing in March that sales of the Weekly World News dropped to 83,000 in 2006 from 153,000 in 2004, while circulation of the National Enquirer fell to 802,000 in 2006 from 1.2 million in 2004.

The company has no publicly traded stock but its bonds are publicly traded.
 
Oh, no! :eek: I loved that one! I noticed they finally began running a disclaimer that their stories were fiction and for entertainment purposes, or something to that effect. The pictures and illustrations were still "real", though.
 
Awwww! :(

I feel a little guilty about never buying one - I was tempted a few times, because they were so outrageous that they really did provide good entertainment standing in checkout lines.
 
Roxanne Appleby said:
Awwww! :(

I feel a little guilty about never buying one - I was tempted a few times, because they were so outrageous that they really did provide good entertainment standing in checkout lines.

I know. It was the only tabloid I was ever tempted to actually purchase. But I could never quite bring myself to buy one.

I wonder how many people out there bought them actually thinking it was 'News'?
 
Hey, c'mon, don't you all remember? This is the top secret publication used for information exchange by the "Men in Black." Must mean government funding problems. Oh my, its the end of the world as we know it.....
 
My personal favorites were the photos of presidents purportedly meeting with space aliens at the White House.

Same aliens--different president. What a coincidence.

I think Jimmy Carter did see a ufo one time. :D
 
NOOOOOO!!!!!!

What will happen to Bat Boy? How will we know when another horse is born with a human face?

This is awful.
 
glynndah said:
I noticed they finally began running a disclaimer that their stories were fiction and for entertainment purposes, or something to that effect.

WHAT?

That's a vicious lie.
 
Dammit, now all I'll have to stare at in the grocery line is pics of scawny celebs being arrested for DUIs. How depressing.
 
My brother and his friends bought a few issues of it. The articles were usually just as hilarious as the headlines.

It's a shame they won't be printing it anymore. But I suppose with the website, and the Onion site still around, we will still have our reliable news sources running strong :D
 
lisa123414 said:
Hey, c'mon, don't you all remember? This is the top secret publication used for information exchange by the "Men in Black." Must mean government funding problems. Oh my, its the end of the world as we know it.....

I was just thinking the same! Where will Agent K get his information now?

Perhaps it's all a massive cover-up; they're afraid that with the "real" news being as manufactured and worthless as it is, people might actually start reading the scandal sheets.
 
BlackShanglan said:
I was just thinking the same! Where will Agent K get his information now?

Perhaps it's all a massive cover-up; they're afraid that with the "real" news being as manufactured and worthless as it is, people might actually start reading the scandal sheets.

Wouldn't be any worse than reality. *grin*
 
babygrrl_702 said:
Wouldn't be any worse than reality. *grin*

Indeed. When one looks at what actually is our current foreign policy situation, it would be a bit of relief to learn that it was designed by space aliens - although perhaps not entirely a surprise.
 
BlackShanglan said:
Indeed. When one looks at what actually is our current foreign policy situation, it would be a bit of relief to learn that it was designed by space aliens - although perhaps not entirely a surprise.
Or Canadian infiltrators ;)
We're annexing you fellows, you know. George W was the last straw.
 
I guess the end was inevitable. The line between traditional journalism and the Weekly World News was erased completely the day my local NBC affiliate opened the noon report with the announcement that Anna Nicole Smith's decaying carcass was "beginning to discolor."

How could Hilary Clinton's adopted alien baby compete with that?

If anyone can locate the photo that accompanied, "Horse Born With Human Face," I will be forever grateful. For years, I was haunted by the questioh, "How does that poor animal graze?" It's mouth wasn't nearly long enough to reach the ground.
 
Damn! I love the Weekly World News. It was just a truthful as the NY Times and Washington Post. :(
 
I think we at Lit should take over!
We can do this!

ex:

"Shereads Love Child of Bush and Cheney"
 
shereads said:
I guess the end was inevitable. The line between traditional journalism and the Weekly World News was erased completely the day my local NBC affiliate opened the noon report with the announcement that Anna Nicole Smith's decaying carcass was "beginning to discolor."

We know the truth, She... The discoloration was only a makeup ruse. Anna Nicole is alive and well, living in Deluth, Minnisota under the assumed name Anna Nicole Jones. ;)
 
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