Another big American newspaper is giving up on print and converting entirely to digital.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, which started in print in 1868, is dispensing with the
old format. The last issue will be Dec. 31.
We seem to get these notices every day, although usually it is from a Gannett or Lee Enterprise newspaper. The big chains have long been
trying to turn print readers into digital subscribers, but they do it in stages—usually, they put out one or two weekday issues and a Sunday edition that is put to bed on Saturday without any
breaking news in it.
But The Atlanta Journal Constitution, reportedly one of the country’s largest newspapers, is switching
without any steps in between—”cold turkey,” as The New York Times puts it.
“The fact is, printing newspapers and putting them in trucks and driving
them around and delivering them on people’s front stoops has not been the most effective way to distribute the news in a very long time,” Andrew Morse, president and publisher of
the Journal-Constitution, told the Times.
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Still, this news is unsettling, almost like when New Jersey’s Star-Ledger scrapped print a couple of
years ago.
Morse notes that the staff already thinks in digital terms. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, a Cox publication, is aiming for 500,000 paid digital
subscribers by the end of 2026, the Times reports. It now has 75,000 digital-only subscribers.
The paper has about 115,000 total paid subscribers, with 75,000 of those
digital-only subscribers, a figure that’s up from about 55,000 at the end of 2023, the Times continues.
This reporter, who like many people grew up with print, now reads only one print
product besides books: The Financial Times weekend edition on Saturday.
We’d be sorry to see that go, if it ever happens.