"Омни" ғылыми-фантастикалық журналының тарихы

Former science and science fiction magazine

Omni was a science and science fiction magazine published for domestic American and UK markets. It contained articles on science, parapsychology, and short works of science fiction and fantasy. It ceased publication abruptly in late 1997, following the death of co founder Kathy Keeton; activity on the magazine's website ended the following April.

Omni was founded by Kathy Keeton and her long time collaborator and future husband Bob Guccione, the publisher of Penthouse magazine. The initial concept came from Keeton, who wanted a magazine "that explored all realms of science and the paranormal, that delved into all corners of the unknown and projected some of those discoveries into fiction". Dick Teresi, an author and former Good Housekeeping editor, wrote the proposal for the magazine, from which a dummy was produced. In pre launch publicity it was referred to as Nova but the name was changed before the first issue went to print to avoid a conflict with the PBS science show of the same name. Guccione described the magazine as "an original if not controversial mixture of science fact, fiction, fantasy and the paranormal". The debut edition had an exclusive interview with Freeman Dyson, a renowned physicist, and the second edition carried an interview with Alvin Toffler, futurist and author of Future Shock.

In its early run, Omni published a number of stories that have become genre classics, such as Orson Scott Card's "Unaccompanied Sonata", William Gibson's "Burning Chrome", "New Rose Hotel" and "Johnny Mnemonic", and George R. R. Martin's "Sandkings". The magazine also published original science fiction and fantasy by William S. Burroughs, Joyce Carol Oates, Jonathan Carroll, Julio Cortázar, T. Coraghessan Boyle, and other mainstream writers. The magazine excerpted Stephen King's novel Firestarter, and featured his short story "The End of the Whole Mess". Omni also brought the works of numerous painters to the attention of a large audience, such as H. R. Giger, De Es Schwertberger and Rallé. In the early 1980s, popular fiction stories from Omni were reprinted in The Best of Omni Science Fiction series and featured art by space artists like Robert McCall. A fictional cover of the magazine appears in the 1984 "Ghostbusters" movie, featuring a photo of the proton pack on the cover.

Omni entered the market at the start of a wave of new science magazines aimed at educated but otherwise "non professional" readers. Science Digest and Science News already served the high school market, and Scientific American and New Scientist the professional, while Omni was arguably the first aimed at "armchair scientists" who were nevertheless well informed about technical issues. The next year, however, Time introduced Discover while the AAAS introduced Science '80. Advertising dollars were spread among the different magazines, and those without deep pockets soon folded in the 1980s, notably Science Digest, while Science '80 merged with Discover. Omni appeared to weather this storm better than most, likely due to its wider selection of contents. In early 1996 publisher Bob Guccione suspended publication of the print edition of Omni, attributing the decision to the rising price of paper and postage. At the end of its print run the circulation was still reported to be more than 700,000 copies a month. In September 1997, Keeton died of complications from surgery for an intestinal obstruction. The staff of Omni Internet was laid off, and no new content was added to the website after April 1998. General Media shut the site down and removed the Omni archives from the Internet in 2003.

Omni magazine was published in at least six languages. The content in the British editions closely followed the North American editions, but with a different numbering sequence. This was mainly accomplished by wrapping the American edition in a new cover which featured British advertising on the inside. At least one British edition was entirely unique and was shipped under the banner of Omni UK. An Italian edition was edited by Alberto Peruzzo and ran for 20 issues from 1981 to 1983, when Peruzzo detached the name Omni from his local edition. The Italian spin off continued with the name Futura, while maintaining the same graphical style and with an unchanged intended audience, for another twenty issues, up to July 1985. The Japanese edition ran from 1982 to the summer of 1989 and included almost entirely different content from the American edition. The German edition began in 1984 and ended in early 1986. The first Spanish edition appeared in November 1986 and ran until the summer of 1988. A Russian edition was published in the Soviet Union beginning in September 1989 in conjunction with the USSR Academy of Sciences. These editions were 80% in English and featured both Russian and English advertising. Publisher Guccione arranged for 20,000 copies of the Russian edition to be placed on news stands and onboard internal Aeroflot flights in the Soviet Union in exchange for an equivalent number of copies of Science in Russia being distributed in the USA. Omni ran subscription adverts beginning in August 1989 for Science in Russia. This arrangement was intended to last for one year and was made possible by the Glasnost events in the Soviet Union.