Fab, the "gay scene" magazine is closing just shy of 20 years of publication

[This post has been updated] Fab magazine, the gay biweekly magazine published in Toronto  by Pink Triangle Press, is closing. According to a story in NOW magazine, editor Phil Villeneuve lamented that the magazine didn't quite reach its 20th anniversary. 

Villeneuve says the decision stems from larger restructuring efforts at Pink Triangle Press, which purchased Fab in February 2008, and who also publishes Xtra!. The decision the cease publication of Fab was “purely financial,” says Villenueve, and comes along with layoffs across several departments at Pink Triangle. 

“Pink Triangle is really focusing on Xtra!,” Villeneuve says. “They’re planning a new daily website, Daily Xtra!, landing early this summer.” He says that he has plans to contribute arts and culture coverage to this new site, with a mind toward bringing in some of the freelancers he worked with to bring the “same fun stuff” he did at Fab to Daily Xtra!. 

[Update: Publisher Brandon Matheson  told the Toronto Star that Fab was having a particularly bad advertising downturn and, with circulation and readership lower than Xtra! (which also publishes editions in Ottawa and Vancouver) Pink Triangle wanted to put all its effort into the more popular publication.]