Americans live in an age in which the news is as pervasive as it is piecemeal and perishable. Anyone can receive, almost instantly, bulletins on the latest dilemma or disaster, discovery or demise--and just as quickly learn that some turn of events has signaled a new tomorrow. The world, often described as growing smaller, is also growing nearer. It has truly become, in the late Marshall McLuhan's phrase, a global village, and its inhabitants have become ever more keenly aware of the intimate impact of the news on their lives.

In recent years this awareness has created a growing demand for TIME. As a result, starting with this issue the weekly circulation of TIME in the U.S. will be officially set at 4,400,000 copies--an increase of 150,000. That brings TIME'S domestic circulation to more than half again the number of copies sold of any other newsmagazine. (TIME also sells an additional 1,325,000 copies of its international editions to the rest of the world.) Underlying the increase is an unprecedented appetite on the part of readers for the particular kind of insight and understanding of the news that TIME provides. During this same period, news programming on commercial television networks has expanded, one all-news cable network has sprung up and more are coming. Yet the demand for TIME has only increased.

The conclusion is inescapable that the magazine has grown not despite the gains of broadcast journalism but in part because of them. More information about what is happening has enhanced our readers' eagerness to grasp its significance in depth and in perspective.

Making the news make sense has been a basic premise of TIME since it invented the newsmagazine in 1923. The editorial qualities and worldwide resources of TIME that have made it pre-eminent around the globe--and that have won it more awards for editorial excellence in recent years than any other publication in its field--will continue to serve those who seek a better understanding of the events and forces that shape their lives. As Circulation Director Richard W. Angle Jr. puts it: "Demand for TIME has never been stronger. That's part of the news-hungry times in which we live."

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