Online magazine Salon, an early staple of internet discourse, announces it will shut down

WASHINGTON (AP) — Salon, one of the early internet's most influential websites that featured sharp voices and political and cultural journalism backed by a liberal sensibility, announced Thursday it would shut down after 31 years of publication. “It has been an extraordinary privilege,” the outlet said in a farewell note.

The announcement, seen as a surprise, cited the fact that “the business realities of independent digital journalism have changed profoundly over the years.” It did not immediately indicate what would become of its employees, though some reported they had lost their jobs.

“Over three decades, Salon has brought together politics, culture, criticism and ideas in a way that was distinctly our own,” the unsigned farewell note said. “Our journalism examined power and politics, questioned assumptions, surfaced stories that deserved attention and made room for perspectives that were too often overlooked. Our writers and editors helped shape conversations about the forces changing our lives.”

Salon began its life in the mid-1990s, barely three years after the internet itself went mainstream and a time when the “World Wide Web” was still written out in that fashion. It launched a decade before the newspaper and print magazine markets imploded — and a decade, too, before the rise of social media fragmented the journalism world.

As its name suggested, Salon was initially styled as an online magazine and meeting place, a site where more provocative opinions and stories that might not be at home in daily newspapers or even then-dominant newsweeklies like Time or Newsweek could surface and generate discussion. It quickly became a place where writers wanted their work to appear.

“The timing was right — readers were tired of bland, market-tested media products, and the internet allowed us to launch something original, something with a strong voice,” founder David Talbot said on the outlet’s five-year anniversary in 2000.

It drew a cadre of high-profile writers and people who would become famous, including Jake Tapper and Glenn Greenwald. Two of its editors-in-chief, Talbot and Joan Walsh, went on to become prominent progressive political voices as well.

As the internet grew, so did Salon's competition. Slate emerged the following year, and soon after, online magazines became the order of the day. Eventually, older print publications like The Atlantic began putting more content online and the marketplace of online ideas grew. Salon used Princess Diana's death in 1997 to go beyond its culture-and-criticism roots and wade into breaking-news coverage.

Salon did not immediately say what would become of its immense online archives, which include three decades of stories from across the world and across topics and genres.

In the statement, Salon also made a point of thanking its readers.

“You came to Salon for the journalism, the dialogue, the essays, the criticism, the unexpected discoveries and the sense that there was a place on the internet where ideas mattered,” it said. “You read, shared, challenged, subscribed, wrote to us and kept coming back. Your engagement made Salon a publication and a community, and it gave our work meaning. We are so grateful for the time you spent with us.”