Report: Wash. Post Co. to Buy Slate

By: E&P Staff The Washington Post Co. is close to buying the politics-and-culture webzine Slate, New York magazine reported today.

The Microsoft-backed online mag was launched in 1996 by Michael Kinsley, the veteran Washington, D.C., writer whose move to the software giant's Redmond, Wash., campus landed him on the cover of Newsweek. It struggled early on to find a viable business model--first advertiser-supported, then adopting and almost immediately dropping a subscription plan--but is currently reported to be breaking even on $6 million in revenue.

In July of this year, Microsoft started shopping the unit. Slate "could benefit from being owned by a company primarily focused on media," Scott Moore, general manager of the MSN Network Experience, which includes Slate and MSNBC.com, told The Washington Post at the time.

Several media companies considered buying the magazine, according to reports, including The New York Times Company, which has treated Slate as something of a farm team, recruiting several of the site's journalists to work at the Times. That talent pool, and Slate's readership, is part of what attracted the Post, said New York magazine.