Those hoping that magazine advertising will pick up this year are still waiting. A slow June offered little hope of a turnaround any time soon.

June ad pages were down 1.3 percent from June 2005, to 20,634, according to the latest numbers from the Publishers Information Bureau. The one consolation: That's slightly better than the 1.7 percent decline in May verus the year-earlier period.

Year to date for the period January through June pages were up just 0.1 percent, to 117,915.59, compared to the six-month period in 2005. Among the 20 magazine categories that Media Life tracks, nine were up and 11 were down.

One factor behind the slow spring has been the ad cutbacks by Detroit. June automotive pages were down 23.4 percent compared with last June, hurting titles that rely on Detroit for a large portion of their advertising. The automotive magazines were down 4.5 percent in ad pages year to date.

Other categories reporting declines are personal finance, down 6.1 percent, fan sports, off  3.3 percent, and business magazines, which are down 2.6 percent.

The men's category also continues to struggle, with overall pages down 7 percent year to date. Playboy and lad titles Maxim and FHM are continuing to see double-digit declines.

But there are brighter spots. These include the weekend magazines, which as a category saw an 11.6 percent boost year-to-date over the 2005 period, led by Life, with pages up 20 percent. Newsweeklies are holding steady with 1.4 percent growth across the category. And fashion and teen magazines are up, with Hachette Filipacchi's Elle and Elle Girl pulling in double-digit growth.

The women's service category was up again, with Martha Stewart Living recording a 74.5 percent growth in ad pages for the year. Her Everyday Food also saw 25.7 percent growth. 

Reported ad revenues were up 3.7 percent through June, based on rate cards before discounting. to $12.034 billion, including Sunday magazines. For the month, revenues were up 1.7 percent, to $2.082 billion, versus June 2005