And Medium Sent Me 2016 Statistics

Today I got a year-end email from Medium, informing me that I’m in the top 10% of readers and writers (whatever that means) on their website. That surprised me, since I’d hardly consider myself a power user. Most of the attention I get seems to be for non-fiction, and more specifically, for responses to other peoples’ writing. Oh, I export some of my stories from here to there, but in general, the response isn’t all that much.

Top 10%?

I can’t decide if that means I’m making progress. It might just mean the platform is dying, and I’m the only one left. Or it might mean the platform is still growing, and that I have a chance of growing with it.

The email broke down the more flattering statistics on my “stories” which means fiction and non-fiction. Not everything I’ve put there. 4 out of 8 pieces I think; possibly not including responses. 184 people have read things I wrote on Medium. Huh. Just guessing I’m more on the top reader end of things, with 1,034 minutes spent reading. 3 minutes a day? No, that seems wrong, too.

Super-secret algorithm, I guess. I’m winning. Why would I doubt it?

Medium hasn’t sent any readers to ReprobateTypewriter.com. (I checked.) And the link from ReprobateTypewriter.com has sent two whole readers Medium-ward. It’s not a frenzy of activity. But then, again, I haven’t really focused on Medium the way I have on Twitter, or on my own website.

Part of it is that my relationship to Medium just hasn’t clicked, yet. I don’t know where it fits into the rest of what I’m doing online. I don’t know whether I should just import stories, and basically turn it into a mirror of Reprobate Typewriter, or if I should use it as a more specialized off-shoot. Somewhere to put the political rants, and the over-sexed pieces that might stir up more debate than I want to bring home.

I envision it as being–in a way–a much broader audience than I have here. A place for my thoughts on education, and presumptive paternity, and communication in general. Did you really want to hear a rant on paternity being contractual? What about sex-ed and consent? You know. That kind of thing… Over there.

I have a few drafts. Most of them are responses to other people. The others are a little more soap-boxy than I’d usually put here on Reprobate Typewriter. I’ve written a few things… and then my self-censoring mechanism kicks in. Most of the time. And I don’t push the publish button.

I haven’t spent much time on Medium. Not working on my own things. Not promoting them. Almost all of the time is reading time.

Four stories, and ten or fifteen minutes reading over my lunch hour a couple of times a week. I’m really not sure what to do with that information, either.

I really like Medium. I like reading on it. I like the things I find there. I just… haven’t gotten to the point where I completely see it as a place to be a writer. I talk to people there… but if I want to tell a story about dragons, I usually put it here.

What about you? Do you ever use Medium? Tips? Hints? And if you do… have you ever thought about starting a publication?

9 Comments

    • Reply

      It’s a really neat platform, and it’s one of the free ones that will take a custom URL. I’m just not sure how stable it is.

  1. aru

    Reply

    voila, i got one too , top 10%
    If thats the case then medium needs to be refurbished, or probably there arent many non-celeb writers.

    48 people reading stories puts me in top 10% is not that good, right?

    • Reply

      I really, really want to find just the right way to weight the variables, but it’s not looking good. Right now, the best hope I can come up with is that it’s actually something out of marketing, and everybody got those letters.

  2. Reply

    I’ve never heard of Medium. I will have to look into it. I hear you on not wanting to get too political on your own website. I have written numerous articles for my blog that are on a political topic and then deleted them without ever showing anyone.

    It’s a tough call.

    • Reply

      I have that same pool of deleted thoughts. It would be one thing, if I thought people would listen, but they’re so entrenched in party politics that the best I could hope for is a nice firestorm from both sides.

  3. Reply

    I’ve come across Medium a few times recently, but I’m not quite sure what to make of it. It looks rather like another place where undiscovered writing can slowly compost.

    I’ve heard it sold as a great place for people to find your writing because it has a huge built-in audience. But how do they find you? By chance or because your piece is popular. How does it get popular? People read it… My head is spinning from the circles. Do you have a nice shoe where I can throw up?

    So, no, I haven’t tried it, but I haven’t ruled out trying it in the future. 🙂

    • Reply

      I think one of the best things about Medium is that you can import stories. So, you can recycle blog material really easily. I have trouble, though, thinking of it as a standalone… uhm… thing. I never saw a built-in audience kick in, though. And I’m not sure that work for an audience is something I’d do without at least setting up something of my own to catch them in. Now that I have more blog to recycle, I might start putting things over there more regularly. See what happens. But I’m not really holding my breath.

  4. Reply

    I follow a couple people who write on political topics on Medium, but haven’t considered posting my own stories there. I feel spread too thin already, and the articles I read are more polished than I’m willing/able to produce for my own blog right now.

    Maybe I’ve written Medium off too quickly.

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