''The World Weekly'' was an international online magazine created in November 2012. The founding editor was James Geary and the founding managing director Rory O'Grady. The magazine ceased publishing in June 2018.

Origins

Incorporated in August 2012, ''The World Weekly'' began publishing in January 2013 with 75,000 print copies being distributed at corporate venues, members' clubs and transport hubs around London. It was backed by

Roland Rudd Roland Dacre Rudd (born April 1961) is the founder and chairman of FGS Global (formerly Finsbury), a public relations firm, and holds a variety of other charitable and non-executive posts. Rudd was educated at Oxford University, becoming Pres ...

, Lord Mervyn Davies and Lord Jonathan Marland, among others. Much like other free newspapers, ''The World Weekly'' was handed out on the streets of London. The plan was to distribute a

freemium Freemium, a portmanteau of the words "free" and "premium", is a pricing strategy by which a basic product or service is provided free of charge, but money (a premium) is charged for additional features, services, or virtual (online) or physical ( ...

print edition first in London, before expanding to Hong Kong and New York City, with the aim of establishing a presence in 45 major cities. Rory O'Grady described ''The World Weekly'' as an independent publication without any "specific political ideology" or "religious/non-religious view" with a "multidimensional" approach to news, saying it was "a new journalistic experiment". Originally the magazine had rotating editors rather than one chief editor.

Content

''The World Weekly'' started out in 2012 aiming at translating content from international news providers and "building a global network of stringers". It aimed to provide international news including non-Western points of view, with both free and premium services, targeting elite business, airlines and hotels. Apart from ''The World Weekly'' founding editor James Geary in 2012, the editor-in-chief in 2014 was Salman Shaheen. Shaheen described the journal's team as "very multicultural from all over the world" and aimed to "cut through the Western bias of big news organisations and get around entrenched political positions", and to "give readers the bigger picture". In 2014, ''The Good Web Guide'' described ''The World Weekly'' as a "slick aggregator" that offered "original analysis". In 2015, its free service included retransmission of "leading" (according to Media Diversity Institute) media articles and content from

think tank A think tank, or public policy institute, is a research institute that performs research and advocacy concerning topics such as social policy, political strategy, economics, military, technology, and culture. Most think tanks are non-governme ...

s and professional

blog A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...

s. In 2015, ''The World Weekly'' was briefly taken offline by what was believed to be a DDoS hacker attack over its critical coverage of

Recep Tayyip Erdogan Recep is a Turkish name deriving from the Arabic name Rajab. It may refer to: People Surname * Aziz Recep (born 1992), German-Greek footballer * Sibel Recep (born 1987), Swedish pop singer Given name * Recep Adanır (1929–2017), Turkish fo ...

. At the time, editor-in-chief Salman Shaheen said the magazine "will not be silenced or intimidated". Shaheen left in 2017. His successor Manuel Langendorf, later a

European Council on Foreign Relations The European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) is a pan-European think tank with offices in seven European capitals. Launched in October 2007, it conducts research on European foreign and security policy and provides a meeting space for decis ...

visiting fellow, was the magazine's editor-in-chief until it ceased publishing in June 2018. The World Weekly Media Ltd was dissolved in October 2019.

Editors

''The World Weekly'' ceased publishing in 2018 after a six-year run. The editors were: * 2012–2014: James Geary,

Cathy Galvin Cathy Galvin (born 14 December 1959) is a British poet and journalist. She has published three poetry collections and is co-founder of the Sunday Times Short Story Award. Her journalism has appeared in the ''Financial Times'', ''The Daily Teleg ...

, Peter Guest, Karen Bartlett * 2014–2017: Salman Shaheen * 2017–2018: Manuel Langendorf

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:World Weekly Magazines established in 2012 British news websites Defunct magazines published in the United Kingdom Magazines disestablished in 2018 Weekly magazines published in the United Kingdom News magazines published in the United Kingdom Online magazines published in the United Kingdom