You and me both, David. You read a LOT at Medium. If you ever stumble across writers who would be a good fit for History of Women, could you let me know? lol.
Hope squared: "there are excellent writers who are NOT getting the exposure they should. I know that. So do you. We all know that. It’s a damn shame. And I hope Medium doesn’t crush their hopes and dreams and aspirations."
What I learned years ago on Medium: don't tie your feelings of self worth as a Creative to Medium's response to what you create. Align yourself with so many Greats who struggled for recognition Write because you can't fathom NOT writing. Write for the one reader who reads you, or the few, or the many. NOT because Medium validates you.
I frankly had no choice but to develop this perspective. For a long, long time, I wrote for maybe five readers, tops. It was hard to keep believing in myself but once I thought - ok. So there are five people reading me. They're the five I'm Meant to write for - I wrote for them, practicing gratitude that they were THERE for me. They were reading me. It tweaked my perception just enough to make it not about me and my 'career' and my ego/acclaim/recognition but about service.
"Now, all of that said — there are excellent writers who are NOT getting the exposure they should. I know that. So do you. We all know that. It’s a damn shame. And I hope Medium doesn’t crush their hopes and dreams and aspirations."
100% yes. And it /is/ a shame. I have a couple of writers whose work should get boosted every time. In my dream scenario, my pub has a stable of 20(ish) writers, and we publish longer form magazine-style stories to a wide audience.
That aside, so much of this post is relatable.
Bad titles...submissions that clearly haven't been edited...writers with odd demands...all of it.
I'm guessing a couple of these are on your radar already:
Terry Barr: Writes primarily about music, and intertwines it with stories of/from his life. Consistently fantastic. We've never met, but I feel like I know him better than some people in my family. Also writes about about cooking.
Kit Campoy: Recently left a 20+ year in retail management, and writes about it. Also has a pub called "License to Chill" that's a nice antidote to the productivity porn Medium seems to be awash in. She does really well to write with empathy while also giving zero F's. That's not easy to do.
Karla Clifton: Took on reviewing all 500 on Rolling Stones best albums. I don't know that her pieces are "boostable," but it's fun to read someone else's take on records I know/love. She also does really well to open and close a loop w/in 500 words or so. Something a LOT of other writers on the platform could learn from.
Janice Harayda: I'm guessing this is a familiar name. She writes a lot abut books & book reviews. Also has a running column on pop culture on Fanfare. Writes with the cool confidence of someone that knows what they're doing (and has the cv to back that up). She used to send pieces my way often. I'd be surprised if I've made more than 3-4 changes total to her work. It always arrives ready to go.
Have you ever watched that old Saturday Night Live skit from the 70s. People go in to order some food - soup, a sandwich, meatloaf, whatever, but they actually only serve - Cheeseburger, Pepsi, Chips!! This is Medium. They say they want quality, well constructed, memorable and all that. But what do we see on the feeds, what gets boosted, what writers grow in views and reads - Cheeseburger, Pepsi, Chips! It just feels like as distraction.
It's like: "Honey, what do you want when Sana Claus comes this year? I want a bike, a car, a doll house the size of our house, I want to meet Miley Cyrus."
Yes, we all want cool things, who asks for lumps of coal and a six-pack of Coke? There are so many good writers on Medium that can do well and bring in new business if GIVEN THE CHANCE. But they don't measure up, apparently. Like the lobster fisherman measuring his catch and throwing back in all the "little" ones. That's what Medium does - throws back the little writers because they don't "measure" up. Sad really.
If writers got 5K reads in May and June why do they suddenly get 432 in July and 321 in August? Something changed. Medium says it's the writer, they didn't do anything different. They did, they changed the algorithm, they changed who sees what writers, they changed what they thought they needed and wanted to grow. It just didn't work.
Now they have those long silly tube-men fluttering in the wind out in front of Medium trying to attract new members.
There's a lot of that, for sure. It's like the newspaper that put out a survey asking their readers what they wanted more of. Readers said they wanted more fancy pants stuff -- more climate and nature, more culture, more social issues, blah, blah. But what do they read? The comics and horoscopes and the stuff on the front page. lol. Finding balance is hard. lol
A valid point for sure. I think newspapers, Medium and many others operate out of fear - if we don't give them what they want (comics, horoscopes, murders) they won't come back. True? Does anyone really test this? This last TV season Dick Wolf (American mega producer) had 9 shows on TV! Nine! They were all similar. All had his genetic blueprint. All had similar plot points - violence, thriller, medical drama, near death - on and on. This is what people wanted?! Or was it what networks wanted (sure bet with Dick) and what viewers get used to?
Hey Linda, I help Prism & Pen with their first submissions emails. LOL a writer sent me a draft article about his views and reads on Medium. He also sent me another draft link about renting houses...Um, that has absolutely nothing to do with the LGBTQ+ community, LOL. Why do people do this??
On other things, you might have heard that Thomas Smith is one of the boosters? He started a new pub called The Generator, which is a pub for all things AI-related. I submitted an article titled: "The Controversy of AI Art in Book Cover Design." This is based on some astonishing personal experiences I've had. Thomas Smith added my article to his list of top picks on Generative AI! There are no guarantees for being boosted, but this was encouraging and validating to see, especially as Thomas works in the AI field himself.
I don't see a "boosted" notification on my graph, but it's slowly climbing in views. Currently at 90ish views. (I know that sounds very low, but it's very high by my standards, since most of my stuff only gets 50 or fewer views, LOL. And maybe half of that for fiction. 😆) Fingers crossed, but even if it doesn't get boosted, I already feel flattered to have made it onto Thomas's curated list!
A friend who primarily writes fiction just got his story boosted. It turns out it was a nonfiction article about fiction-writing, haha. It was an excellent article, but some of us other fiction writers wonder if Medium truly will exclude fiction from the boosting. Though at least nonfiction articles about the fiction writing craft count.
This gives me some hope. I had a feeling that the only things that would see a boost were boilerplate productivity, coding, and health & wellness pieces.
Yeah thankfully it's not only those topics. Another friend who had his boosted, had an article called, "Artificial Intelligence, Pornography, and a Brave New World". He was talking about the AI Deepfake problem.
I would love to see more quality work get the exposure it deserves.
You and me both, David. You read a LOT at Medium. If you ever stumble across writers who would be a good fit for History of Women, could you let me know? lol.
Hope squared: "there are excellent writers who are NOT getting the exposure they should. I know that. So do you. We all know that. It’s a damn shame. And I hope Medium doesn’t crush their hopes and dreams and aspirations."
What I learned years ago on Medium: don't tie your feelings of self worth as a Creative to Medium's response to what you create. Align yourself with so many Greats who struggled for recognition Write because you can't fathom NOT writing. Write for the one reader who reads you, or the few, or the many. NOT because Medium validates you.
Yes, that's an important point Jen. It's hard to do, but important.
I frankly had no choice but to develop this perspective. For a long, long time, I wrote for maybe five readers, tops. It was hard to keep believing in myself but once I thought - ok. So there are five people reading me. They're the five I'm Meant to write for - I wrote for them, practicing gratitude that they were THERE for me. They were reading me. It tweaked my perception just enough to make it not about me and my 'career' and my ego/acclaim/recognition but about service.
That was me in the beginning, too. I think I had 7 readers for the LONGEST time.
If I can find any new women who write history well, Linda, I will. The trouble is that my feed tends to be biased towards authors I support already...
Thanks, David. True enough but you seem to find people before me, so if you have favorites feel welcome to share. :)
"Now, all of that said — there are excellent writers who are NOT getting the exposure they should. I know that. So do you. We all know that. It’s a damn shame. And I hope Medium doesn’t crush their hopes and dreams and aspirations."
100% yes. And it /is/ a shame. I have a couple of writers whose work should get boosted every time. In my dream scenario, my pub has a stable of 20(ish) writers, and we publish longer form magazine-style stories to a wide audience.
That aside, so much of this post is relatable.
Bad titles...submissions that clearly haven't been edited...writers with odd demands...all of it.
I'd love to know some of them if you're game to share. You can even just email me. Never hurts to find some new writers worth reading. :)
I'm guessing a couple of these are on your radar already:
Terry Barr: Writes primarily about music, and intertwines it with stories of/from his life. Consistently fantastic. We've never met, but I feel like I know him better than some people in my family. Also writes about about cooking.
Kit Campoy: Recently left a 20+ year in retail management, and writes about it. Also has a pub called "License to Chill" that's a nice antidote to the productivity porn Medium seems to be awash in. She does really well to write with empathy while also giving zero F's. That's not easy to do.
Karla Clifton: Took on reviewing all 500 on Rolling Stones best albums. I don't know that her pieces are "boostable," but it's fun to read someone else's take on records I know/love. She also does really well to open and close a loop w/in 500 words or so. Something a LOT of other writers on the platform could learn from.
Janice Harayda: I'm guessing this is a familiar name. She writes a lot abut books & book reviews. Also has a running column on pop culture on Fanfare. Writes with the cool confidence of someone that knows what they're doing (and has the cv to back that up). She used to send pieces my way often. I'd be surprised if I've made more than 3-4 changes total to her work. It always arrives ready to go.
Have you ever watched that old Saturday Night Live skit from the 70s. People go in to order some food - soup, a sandwich, meatloaf, whatever, but they actually only serve - Cheeseburger, Pepsi, Chips!! This is Medium. They say they want quality, well constructed, memorable and all that. But what do we see on the feeds, what gets boosted, what writers grow in views and reads - Cheeseburger, Pepsi, Chips! It just feels like as distraction.
It's like: "Honey, what do you want when Sana Claus comes this year? I want a bike, a car, a doll house the size of our house, I want to meet Miley Cyrus."
Yes, we all want cool things, who asks for lumps of coal and a six-pack of Coke? There are so many good writers on Medium that can do well and bring in new business if GIVEN THE CHANCE. But they don't measure up, apparently. Like the lobster fisherman measuring his catch and throwing back in all the "little" ones. That's what Medium does - throws back the little writers because they don't "measure" up. Sad really.
If writers got 5K reads in May and June why do they suddenly get 432 in July and 321 in August? Something changed. Medium says it's the writer, they didn't do anything different. They did, they changed the algorithm, they changed who sees what writers, they changed what they thought they needed and wanted to grow. It just didn't work.
Now they have those long silly tube-men fluttering in the wind out in front of Medium trying to attract new members.
Other than that - all is good. 🤗😜
There's a lot of that, for sure. It's like the newspaper that put out a survey asking their readers what they wanted more of. Readers said they wanted more fancy pants stuff -- more climate and nature, more culture, more social issues, blah, blah. But what do they read? The comics and horoscopes and the stuff on the front page. lol. Finding balance is hard. lol
A valid point for sure. I think newspapers, Medium and many others operate out of fear - if we don't give them what they want (comics, horoscopes, murders) they won't come back. True? Does anyone really test this? This last TV season Dick Wolf (American mega producer) had 9 shows on TV! Nine! They were all similar. All had his genetic blueprint. All had similar plot points - violence, thriller, medical drama, near death - on and on. This is what people wanted?! Or was it what networks wanted (sure bet with Dick) and what viewers get used to?
The jury is out on this one. Cheers, Linda
Writing is like a child.
The idea is born.
Through baby steps, there are experiments.
There are falls. Most writers get up and try again until they get it write (oops, right).
Then for some reason, they become a recalcitrant child and think they know it all.
Do you know what I mean?
I can just imagine the trials and tribulations you encounter.
I do know exactly what you mean. I see it really often. Like, WHY did I create a submission guide? lol
Hey Linda, I help Prism & Pen with their first submissions emails. LOL a writer sent me a draft article about his views and reads on Medium. He also sent me another draft link about renting houses...Um, that has absolutely nothing to do with the LGBTQ+ community, LOL. Why do people do this??
On other things, you might have heard that Thomas Smith is one of the boosters? He started a new pub called The Generator, which is a pub for all things AI-related. I submitted an article titled: "The Controversy of AI Art in Book Cover Design." This is based on some astonishing personal experiences I've had. Thomas Smith added my article to his list of top picks on Generative AI! There are no guarantees for being boosted, but this was encouraging and validating to see, especially as Thomas works in the AI field himself.
I don't see a "boosted" notification on my graph, but it's slowly climbing in views. Currently at 90ish views. (I know that sounds very low, but it's very high by my standards, since most of my stuff only gets 50 or fewer views, LOL. And maybe half of that for fiction. 😆) Fingers crossed, but even if it doesn't get boosted, I already feel flattered to have made it onto Thomas's curated list!
A friend who primarily writes fiction just got his story boosted. It turns out it was a nonfiction article about fiction-writing, haha. It was an excellent article, but some of us other fiction writers wonder if Medium truly will exclude fiction from the boosting. Though at least nonfiction articles about the fiction writing craft count.
This gives me some hope. I had a feeling that the only things that would see a boost were boilerplate productivity, coding, and health & wellness pieces.
Yeah thankfully it's not only those topics. Another friend who had his boosted, had an article called, "Artificial Intelligence, Pornography, and a Brave New World". He was talking about the AI Deepfake problem.
...I know what you mean :)
And once again Medium give the big FU to creative writers. Not surprising though.