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Masters of ScaleHow The Atlantic went from losing $20 million a year to profitable (CEO Nicholas Thompson)
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At a glance
WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT
Atlantic CEO Nick Thompson on Turnaround, AI Deals, and Running
- Nick Thompson took the Atlantic CEO job in 2020 because he believed his comparative advantage was building business models for serious journalism, and the magazine's journalism was already excellent.
- The turnaround came from relentless data-driven testing of the paywall, marketing and offers, which took subscribers from about 800,000 to 1.46 million and moved the company from heavy losses to profit.
- Thompson defends the OpenAI licensing deal despite internal anger, arguing that publishers should either sue or license, and that AI companies must eventually build a real, ongoing exchange of value with publishers.
- He discusses leading through divisive times by keeping church-and-state separation between editorial and business, limiting his public statements to core issues, and retaining talent against Substack-style independence.
- In the memoir segment, Thompson describes his father's rise and fall and how a mental block, not training, kept him stuck at a 2:43 marathon for over a decade.
IDEAS WORTH REMEMBERING
5 ideasComparative advantage guided his career move
Thompson said what matters is what you do best relative to your peers, and he judged his edge to be figuring out business models for serious journalism rather than writing.
Iterative testing drove the subscription hockey stick
Inspired by how tech companies like Amazon test every variable, The Atlantic ran about 230 paywall-related tests last year, which improved subscription growth after a scary year two when numbers dipped.
Profits are reinvested into journalism
Thompson says The Atlantic must be profitable, and any profit beyond a small margin goes back into hiring journalists and growing influence, given owner Laurene Powell Jobs doesn't want to be treated like an ATM.
License or sue, but don't just complain
Thompson argues AI firms scraped The Atlantic's content and built competing products, so he chose to get compensated and gain a seat at the table, while reserving legal rights and noting The Atlantic is party to another lawsuit.
Don't rely on platform goodwill, rely on incentives
He says tech partners are self-interested capitalists, so publishers should build direct relationships through print, the app and newsletters, and push for mutually beneficial models like revenue sharing or subscription call-outs.
WORDS WORTH SAVING
5 quotesthere's this concept of comparative advantage where what matters in life is not what you are best at, it's what you are best at relative to your peers.
— Nick Thompson
none of these partners can be trusted, right? Not because they're bad people. They're good people. They're friends of mine, right? But they're capitalists, and they're self-interested, and they would rather they make money than you make money
— Nick Thompson
you shouldn't rely on their goodwill, but you should rely on their economic incentives.
— Nick Thompson
my father was both the person I was most like, the person I in some ways had spent my adult life trying to please and to live up to the expectations he set, and the person I was most desperate not to become.
— Nick Thompson
what makes you fast or makes you slow is often buried much deeper than you think, and it can be tied up in your expectations.
— Nick Thompson
SPEAKERS
Nick Thompson
guestCEO of The Atlantic and author of the memoir The Running Ground.
Jeff Berman
hostHost/interviewer on Masters of Scale.
High quality AI-generated summary created from speaker-labeled transcript.
