
The Atlantic Turns a Profit, With an Eye on the Web - J3L2404
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/13/business/media/13atlantic.html?src=twr
======
chime
> Advertising salespeople were told it did not matter what percentage of their
> sales were digital and what percentage print; they just needed to hit one
> sales target.

How is this not absolutely, positively common sense in 2010? I could
understand in 1999, getting more people to advertize on your website could
accomplish some internal goal but in 2010, why does anything other than at
actual dollar amount matter?

~~~
patio11
The legacy media has an emotional connection to their old business, because it
is the source of their power and privilege. If they kill the paper edition
_they would be a website_ and they don't invite writers from web sites to
dinners at the White House or the best Manhattan parties. They don't give
Pulitzers to web sites. They don't make movies about courageous whistle
blowing web masters. Columbia doesn't do lectures for people who run web
sites.

Perhaps most importantly, legacy media knows it is superior to websites, and
doesn't feel the need to treat you as a professional colleague or peer
publication if you aren't on dead tree. They'll happily just lift your stuff
or ignore it. Want to get a job with them? Pfft, you ran a website? Darling,
this is the _New York Times_. We hire _journalists_ here.

~~~
anamax
> Columbia doesn't do lectures for people who run web sites.

CUNY does.

[http://www.buzzmachine.com/2010/12/01/cunys-
entrepreneurial-...](http://www.buzzmachine.com/2010/12/01/cunys-
entrepreneurial-journalism-program/)

That said, CUNY is playing upstart here.

~~~
Locke1689
I think Patrick's post was decidedly tongue-in-cheek.

~~~
anamax
His comment is closer to true taken straight than taken tongue-in-cheek.

------
sachinag
There are precious few people who can both blog and write long-form well. The
Atlantic employs three: Andrew Sullivan, Ta-Nehisi Coates, and James Fallows.

I don't understand the Wire, and they've done some crazy redesign things that
they've had to roll back (writer blogs didn't have permalinks for about a week
earlier), so I'm quite skeptical that this was just about finding a new
business model. In my opinion, they made exceptionally smart editorial
decisions that allowed them to pull this off.

~~~
jbellis
Megan McArdle is a fourth.

~~~
RyanMcGreal
Crap, I downvoted your comment in error - I meant to upvote it.

Any time HN wants to remove the 'feature' that prevents users from changing
votes, that would be great.

------
meterplech
It's really interesting that two of the (only?) magazines that seem to be
doing well are the very intellectually focused Atlantic and Economist right
now. Ironically this is a piece in Atlantic about the Economist's success:
[http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/07/the-
news...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/07/the-newsweekly-
rsquo-s-last-stand/7489/)

~~~
petercooper
Outside of the US, Monocle - <http://www.monocle.com/> \- is doing very well
and is similarly intellectual. It was founded by Tyler Brule, the guy who
founded the similarly successful _Wallpaper_ in the 90s. It's like The
Economist meets Vanity Fair and describes itself as "a global briefing
covering international affairs, business, culture and design." I love it. New
York Magazine ran a feature all about it and its model just a week ago:
<http://nymag.com/news/media/69921/>

An even more successful one is Germany's Der Spiegel - they employ about 380
people and run a pretty intellectual ship. They have entire sections of their
building dedicated to things like the "fact checking department" and such.
Turning a profit with such a large ship either shows how good they are or how
loyal Germans are to their flagship magazines..

~~~
spitfire
God yes. I've been a subscriber since about the begining. Tyler has a very no
bullshit view on business - real business done well. The first issue had an
interview with the CEO of lego, they regularly feature small business and
leaders in their video series.

He also has a fantastic eye for style (not surprising), more people should
aspire to his level.

------
seldo
Prior to its reinvention of itself, my primary exposure to the Atlantic was as
the original publisher of Vannevar Bush's prophetic article As We May Think:

[http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1969/12/as-we-
ma...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1969/12/as-we-may-
think/3881/)

(NB: the timestamp says 1969, presumably because there's some code somewhere
which isn't expecting a timestamp from prior to 1970-01-01)

It seems fitting that the publisher of an article that so accurately predicted
so much future technology should be keen to embrace it.

------
hristov
It is funny how they do not mention how the Atlantic takes payments from
potential subjects of their stories (i.e., bribes).

[http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/07/not_just_w...](http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/07/not_just_wapo_atlantics_corporate-
sponsored_salons.php?ref=fpb)

~~~
util
They do mention the conferences although not in this light. Interesting.

------
benmccann
According to the article they're projected to make $6.1 million in revenue for
the year. I'm estimating they'll have received 300 million page views over
this period of time based of Quantcast and figures from the article. This
means they're making about $0.02 per page view, which seems high to me. Is
this a somewhat believable number that's inline with industry averages?

I've heard news sites make $7-10 CPM. Is this per ad, but they show multiple
ads, so they make more like $20RPM in total (which would line up with my
estimates)?

------
quizbiz
I don't think I have ever read an issue of The Atlantic. This article alone is
fantastic press for them.

------
marcuswestin
Can't get past the login page :/

~~~
dbz
Sorry for all of my chrome junk in the url:

[http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8...](http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=atlantic+turns+profit+nytimes.com&safe=strict)

