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On June 30, 2009, after 16 years, the giant of Hip-Hop magazines, known as Vibe folded and closed its doors.

Along with the physical magazine, Vibe Media Group has also informed all that Vibe.com, VibeTV and Vibe Books has also been shut down. The last issue for the magazine will be the June/July printing although the Dream featured August issue is already complete.

Steve Aaron, Vibe Magazine’s CEO, was able to confirm that the publication’s career has come to an end. Although the blow seems unexpected and sudden to readers and fans of the magazine, as with many other publication, the recession has continued to affect all forms of print.

The capital market collapsing has attributed to the downfall of the publication, according to Aaron. The past few months, the publication had ventured out for investment resources and worked closely with their bank in order to find an answer for the ongoing problem. The lack of investment resources that was necessary in restructuring their stacked debt only made the ending inevitable.

Overall, the collapse of print advertising had hit Vibe hard as advertisers such as automotive and fashion companies,which were the bulk of their top 10 advertisers, were out of business or had discontinued advertisement.

Revenue for Vibe had shot down to 40% from the previous year and circulation had dropped from 800,000 to 600,000 earlier this year, according to the Publishers Information Bureau. Along with this, the frequency of the magazine had dropped from 12 per year to 10.

According to a Vibe spokesperson, staffers also had their work week cut down to four and had their salaries raped 10 to 15 percent.

There may, however, be light at the end of the tunnel for Vibe as legendary producer Quincy Jones, who is the founder and launched the magazine in 1993, has been reported to wanting to buy back the publication, according to Essence Magazine. Feeling that the magazine was mistreated after it left his hands, he plans to restore it and even take it online where it would be profitable than the obsolete print.