Starting with the June 29th issue, Cecil Cheung will tally the ad pages, article pages and the total page count every week in Newsweek and TIME. Readers can then make their own judgments about how the magazine competitors are faring in this tough magazine environment.

Like looking at a tragic cancer victim, TIME Magazine seems to grow thinner by the week. So how much better off is Newsweek, TIME’s direct competitor? Did its recent re-design help keep it ahead of TIME in ad sales?

iMediaEthics summer intern Cecil Cheung, like a doctor measuring vital signs (or lack of them) will, henceforth, do a weekly tally of Newsweek’s and TIME’s ad, article and total page count so that you can judge for yourself. Cheung will also calculate the percentage each week of ad pages to total pages.

As background: New York Times reported in a May 23, 2009 article about Newsweek’s re-design launch that, “Newsweek has responded to punishing advertising and circulation economics — it was down over 23 percent in advertising pages in the first quarter of the year compared with the first quarter last year.” The overall magazine industry had a 26% drop in the same quarter according to an April 15 article, also in the Times.

Ads pages              23 (31.08%) (Including front, back inside cover, back cover)
Pages with Text:     45
Full Page Photo:      5

Total Pages:             74 (including covers)

Ads pages:             16 (26.67%) (Including front, back inside cover, back cover)
Pages with Text:     36
Full Page Photo :     8

Total pages:             60  (including covers)

UPDATE: 06/30/09 : We are counting covers in total page counts