John C. Mellott, the affable publisher of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, is moving his forearm up and down like a lever. “This,” he explains, “is the skillful management of a toggle.” Where is a photographer when you really need one? Of course, if I were a “mojo”—“mobile journalist”—for the AJC, I’d have my digital point-and-shoot at the ready, and then I’d whip out my laptop and file something online. That is, if I could figure out precisely what Mellott’s arm gesture means for the future of journalism and the Journal-Constitution.

I’ve been asking Mellott to describe the business model behind the AJC’s recent restructuring, designed, among other things, to put digital operations on an equal footing with print. The fifty-year-old Mellott, an avid golfer who took over as publisher in 2004 “with a mandate for change,” has watched print advertising revenue drop precipitously, in line with industry trends. Cox Enterprises, which owns the paper, is privately held, and Mellott won’t release any data, but he says that the decline, particularly in classifieds, over the last twelve to eighteen months, “has been steeper than in the prior five-year period,” imbuing his mandate with some urgency.

And so, after visits by consultants, company-wide brainstorming, seemingly endless meetings, and a mounting pile of information-dense binders that still clutter Mellott’s office, a plan took shape. “What our business will be about going forward,” he says, “is the skillful management of the slow decline of the printed product and the accelerated growth of the Internet”—i.e., the toggle.

The goal is to make the still-profitable print newspaper more vital than ever for the “settled adults” who are its core audience, but to give up on chasing marginal readers. At the same time, the company is pouring resources into ajc.com, trying to lure more readers...

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