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My Profile Top News Reuters top ten news stories delivered to your inbox each day. Subscribe You are here: Home > News > Entertainment > Article Home Business & Finance News U.S. Politics International Technology Entertainment Film Music People Television Arts Industry Sports Lifestyle Oddly Enough Health Science Special Coverage Video Pictures Your View The Great Debate Blogs Weather Reader Feedback Do More With Reuters RSS Widgets Mobile Podcasts Newsletters Your View Make Reuters My Homepage Partner Services CareerBuilder Affiliate Network Professional Products Support (Customer Zone) Reuters Media Financial Products About Thomson Reuters With Playboy sale, an icon bows to changing times Fri Nov 13, 2009 8:34pm EST Email | Print | Share | Reprints | Single Page [-] Text [+] By Alex Dobuzinskis LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Playboy founder Hugh Hefner changed American pop culture, one centerfold at a time. With his Playboy Enterprises Inc in talks to be sold for about $300 million, the 83 year-old Hefner will be giving up control over the iconic adult entertainment empire he founded that was instrumental in shaping society's opinions on nudity, sex and free speech. With $600, Hefner in 1953 published the first Playboy magazine with a partially nude photo of Marilyn Monroe at its center. The magazine would become not only one of the most successful publications ever, but also a brand that led many Americans to think about sex in a more carefree way. "Hef" turned Playboy and its bunny head logo into a symbol for a lifestyle he embodied as bachelor extraordinaire, living in a mansion surrounded by wealth and beautiful women. "This guy was one of the major players in the transformation of American culture in the second half of the 20th century and not just because he had a magazine with naked women in it," said Robert Thompson, a professor of pop culture at Syracuse University. In 1972, Playboy had a worldwide circulation of 7 million, but that has been in decline ever since, as the liberalization of sexual attitudes Hefner promoted became more mainstream -- and more competitive. But even as it grew ever more popular, the magazine created rivals such as Penthouse and Hustler. In the 1980s, adult videos grew into a major business and by the late 1990s, the rise of the Internet and free pornography on the Web became Playboy's greatest rival for an audience. REALITY STAR Hefner remains in the limelight today, showing up at media events with numerous girlfriends by his side. He enjoyed a role in reality television show "The Girls Next Door" on cable network E! and his dating life and break-up with model Holly Madison made him a staple of celebrity magazines. Hefner has said that growing up during the depression he always looked back wistfully to the 1920s age of flappers as an era of freedom he had missed. He has described himself as having liberated America from its Puritan past and experts agree he did make sexual images and content more acceptable to Americans. But Playboy magazine also showed men how to enjoy stylish clothing, good liquor, sports cars and other luxuries, and became a standard bearer for that lifestyle -- real or imagined. "All that kind of stuff just piled up issue after issue -- promoting that idea of consumer abundance as being synonymous with the good life in this country -- and Hefner is very important in promoting that idea," said Steven Watts, author of "Mr. Playboy: Hugh Hefner and the American Dream." But as Playboy's fortunes waned, some of the symbols of wealth that surrounded Hefner became harder for him to hang on to. In the early 1980s, he had to give up a private jet plane with a bedroom, a miniature disco and a kitchen, Watts said. Continued... View article on single page Share: Del.icio.us Digg Mixx Yahoo! 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Slideshow Most Popular on Reuters Articles Video First U.S. marijuana cafe opens in Portland Russia's Putin wins respect at hip-hop party With Playboy sale, an icon bows to changing times Farmers scramble to finish harvest from hell Ex-lawmaker gets 13 years in prison for bribery Medical workers balk at mandatory flu vaccines Balloon boy parents face sentence in December | Video U.S. arrests and charges two Madoff programmers And the ugliest people are... 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