I Finally Subscribed to The Atlantic

I’ve been reading The Atlantic for years—sometimes directly but usually through Apple News. I’ve admired their deep reporting, sharp writing, and the fact that their journalists seem to care more about insight than clicks. But despite all that, I never subscribed.

It wasn’t deliberate. Like a lot of readers today, I just consumed. I’d follow a link, consume a few pieces a month, and then move on. Apple News made it even easier. Once I started using it regularly, The Atlantic became one of the sources added to my feed. Their stories appeared frequently (it’s all about the algorithm!), and they were not only of interest to me vut incredibly well written.

Then this morning I read a piece in The Atlantic that finally changed things. The title? “The End of Publishing as We Know It”.

It described how generative AI tools including chatbots, search overviews, and article summarizers are draining traffic from news websites. The reader is getting everything the need inside the AI app and and have follow on question with context. So why would they ever leave that interface? Well, most aren’t!

Some publishers are seeing traffic drops as high as 34%. Ad revenue is cratering. Subscription growth is stalling. And there’s a real chance, the article warned, that some of our most trusted sources of journalism could disappear almost overnight.

I don’t know why it took that article for things to change in my brain but I immediately decided I wanted to support “The Atlantic” and not only the great but incredibly important work of their reporters. But not before I checked with my wife first. In some ways, I wanted to make sure it wasn’t being impulsive. In retrospect, how could waiting 4-5 years to subscribe be impulsive?!

And here’s the kicker: the highest-tier subscription was only $120 a year. That’s less than I spend in a single month at the gym. I don’t even know how The Atlantic can survive on memberships that cheap. Sadly, the answer is probably can’t unless its readers take action and subscribe.

So if you want thoughtful, important reporting to stick around, someone’s got to pay for it. It certainly won’t be the AI companies.