'Radar' Folds. Okay, Fine: 'Radar' Folds *Again*

I would be trapped in a courtroom on the day that Radar, the chronically impecunious but beloved pop culture magazine where I worked before joining Portfolio, went out of business for the third time. I just emerged from my jury-duty hole to learn that American Media has bought Radar Online -- which preceded its print sibling into existence on the third go-round, and which I spent most of my time there working on -- and will re-launch the site under the command of David Perel, now editor of the National Enquirer.

I don't think any of my former colleagues would say this is a shocking development, but it is a sad one. Radar was one of a vanishing rump of independent, general-interest magazines that existed not because it served some market niche with particular value to advertisers but because a bunch of smart, creative people took the hopeful view that it should be possible to create a viable business just by publishing the sorts of stories they'd want to read. That sort of idealism has a place, but it's not as a print magazine in this ad economy.

On the other hand, Radar's death is a uniquely fitting exclamation mark for Nick Denton's tenure as Gawker's day-to-day editor.

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