Session: 1234567891011121314151617         Page 573574575576577578579580581582583584585586587588589590591592593594595596597598599600 of 824

to make maximum efforts. Then TIME would surge ahead. That's been going on for twenty-five years--it's still going on right now. Newsweek for ten years was boasting about the fact that it carried more pages. Why carrying more pages is important has always eluded me, but anyway, that's something you brag about. In the last year TIME got ahead of Newsweek pages, so TIME made a big noise about the fact that it was ahead on pages. In fact, neither TIME nor Newsweek were doing particularly well the last year. But that's in private. In public, you promote whatever you have.

But do you think some of the business decisions that were made on TIME were affected by what had been learned at LIFE? In terms of increasing circulation or not increasing circulation, for example.

I don't think so. [laughs] I don't think there was that much of a parallel. I think the increases would usually take place--when you make sizable increases--when you feel pretty confident about your editorial product, when your renewal figures were looking pretty good, and when the test on direct mail was looking good. Then you'd take a chance on either jumping the circulation or jumping the price, and occasionally, jumping both. But, you know, it's just a call! There's no way of knowing that you're right or not, nor is there any way of knowing how the competition will respond. Or for that matter what the competition is. In those days the competition for TIME, below it was Newsweek and above it was television. The competition varies all the time. Whereas everybody said television would go on up and up and up, in