Writers are "quiet quitting" Medium
Happy Friday
Let me tell you a secret. Don’t flounce. Don’t ever flounce.
Not much of a secret, I know. lol.
Back in June, a writer with 57K followers on Medium flounced big time. Posted a long diatribe about how the site sucks, the algorithm sucks, the “engineers” f-ed up the site so bad it’s not fixable and it was way better a few years ago. Waste of time, etc.
Plus, all the people there are a big old waste of time. And besides. He was sick of seeing “middle aged women” making money by complaining about patriarchy, privilege and self help bros. So he said he’s done. Can’t do it anymore.
Good. Bye.
Flounce, flounce, flounce. lol.
It’s not a good look.
So… apparently he’s back. Turns out he was just burned out from writing too much. That’s his explanation. But he had a great rest and he’s back.
He’s so excited because yay, Tony. He’s absolutely sure the site is going to take off again any day now. It’s going to be BIG again. Just like in the past. He can just feel it. Because yay Tony.
Most people don’t do stuff like that. They don’t bring all that drama.
Honestly, most humans just quit. Like if you’re unhappy with a store, you don’t shop there anymore. And when people get frustrated with Medium, they just slip away. They don’t announce it or make a big deal of it. They just stop showing up.
Michael Thompson, 77K followers. Gone.
Matt Lillywhite, 40K followers, gone.
Jessica Valenti. Jessica Lynn. Tons more. Just quietly slipped away.
But also? Not everyone quits.
A lot of writers are just quiet quitting.
Mostly, we think of quiet quitting in regard to jobs. It means not going the extra mile anymore. Because it’s never rewarded. Because the extra mile is too often expected and too seldom appreciated or rewarded. That’s common in the workplace.
Quiet quitting means they do their job, but nothing more than is required. No extra hours, no extra effort. No extra anything. Just do enough to get by.
Writers do that, too. And a lot are doing it on Medium.
Know why?
Too many stupid changes that affect views and pay. Not enough transparency. Not listening to writers. Changing to “secret distribution” so they can choose which stories get promoted but no one gets to know. Too much nonsense, all around.
In one of the interviews with Tony, he said his focus is on readers, not writers. He thinks there will always be writers, so it’s readers he needs to focus on.
That’s like a restaurant saying they don’t care about the chef, they need to focus on putting people at the tables. Except that the food is “why” people go to a restaurant. Serve crappy food once too often and the tables will be empty.
Same thing. Good writers draw readers just like good food draws eaters.
I wrote a story yesterday asking why my follower feed is full of people I don’t follow. Turns out a lot of others are seeing the same. A surprising number messaged to say they haven’t been spending much time at Medium. Not like they used to.
They still show up and write. But not as often.
They still show up and read. But not as much.
They’re quiet quitting.
I blame that squarely on Medium.
So what do you do if you’re a writer who doesn’t want to throw in the towel?
I suggest creating a footer asking readers to sign up for email notifications. It’s what I’m going to do. And then I’ll go back and paste the footer into any older stories that are still getting reads.
So if the feed is wonky, or the algorithm waves its magic wand and makes me disappear from feeds, at least my readers will get an email when I publish.
I figure it’s the best we can do to work with a broken system.
Thoughts?
More reading…
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xo,
Linda
The reason bosses "don't get it," as with Medium and at other institutions, is that the minute they attain power, their focus actually is not on serving readers or customers. Their lascivious concern is putting their icky hands on systems that fatten the bottom line. Writers/workers are considered replaceable peons. They are looked down upon as an annoying means to that end who must be controlled/cajoled. All those pennies bosses don't pay people really add up. And their penis rockets come in many forms.
I agree with your thoughts and what the other commenters are saying. Nothing new to add. Wait, that's not true. I do have one thing to add, even though Medium is not great for writers for all the reasons that have been mentioned, I still get more readers than back when I was just doing a personal blog for free. Remember those days?