It doesn't sound to me like they thought they were going to make money publishing it, rather the Astra Publishing wanted to raise its profile with what is essen

It doesn't sound to me like they thought they were going to make money publishing it, rather the Astra Publishing wanted to raise its profile with what is essentially a low volume high quality loss leader. 9000 copies an issue is small volume, even if you sell it out, and whether distributed by random house or not 9000 just isn't that many. Then at some point the economic realities hit Astra and they realized the PR project wasn't worth the amount of money they were spending keeping it going. But it doesn't sound like it was ever organized to make money.