Member-only story
Some of Medium’s Best Writers Are Leaving the Site
What does this site offer writers who care about quality, not clickbait?
I had an email this week. One of my Medium friends, who is also one of the best writers I read here, is giving Medium the heave-ho. After giving it a few chances to rebound in the past few months they decided to cut their losses. I can’t really blame them, they are getting more reads and are much better paid on other sites now.
This is a writer who had a decent following, was regularly published in the big Medium publications, was an avid reader, and a great asset to the site, but still, they struggled to get many reads here lately.
It’s not just me, I realized.
Since the change in leadership and changes to distribution (which they claim haven’t been changed, ok) my reads have tanked, I have had a sharp increase in sexbot followers, creepy dm’s, and an all-time low return read rate. Awesome times here at Medium.
This friend leaving feels like the last straw, a lot of my favorite writers here have already performed slow or Irish exits it seems. These were all people who wrote top-quality, often viral, or well-performing articles for the site. Are there really that many writers of their caliber willing to pour their energy into the ever-decreasing results we receive from Medium?
