There was a time when the newsweeklies set the agenda for the nation's conversation - when Time and Newsweek would digest the events of the week and US readers would wait by their mailboxes to see what was on the covers.

Those days have passed, and come the end of the year, the print edition of Newsweek will pass, too. Cause of death: The march of time.

"The tempo of the news and the Web have completely overtaken the news magazines," said Stephen G. Smith, editor of the Washington Examiner and the holder of an unprecedented newsweekly triple crown - nation editor at Time, editor of US News and World Report, and executive editor of Newsweek from 1986 to 1991.