Medium Paywall: Conclusion. The Virtue of Sherwood Forest
Or Social Banditry and the Tension of Custodial Independence
During the past several days, I’ve read the various articles and posts surrounding this business decision by Medium. I’ve even discussed with a close friend, who is often something of an informal personal advisor too, the viability of signing up, to understand the nature of the beast and in this, I can empathise with those who jumped in feet first, and others like Michael (Michael Haupt), who has struggle with a decision.
Two days ago I received a response to my initial reply to Ev Williams membership email and thank you GERALD from USER HAPPINESS here on Medium Staff. I do appreciate you taking the time to write back to me on Mr Williams’s behalf. I have to trust that GERALD won’t mind my quoting from his email for the sake of clarification; it is also pertinent as to the bone of contention and why it’s all turning into a moot wrestling match.
For writers of fiction and poetry who have flocked to Medium and together, created one of the most vibrant digital writer/reader communities around; this is what has really got everyone somewhat riled up:
“ The Medium Membership is aimed at providing subscribed readers with the best stories by authors who know their subjects best … we want to remove the possibility of clickbait by charging for this content. (Sounds fair enough on first reading) … As such, this Medium Membership offering is being built for readers. At this time, there is no special features for writers who are part of the Medium Membership. However we are accepting pitches for stories to be included in this special content.”
Sidenote: This special content refers to specified six ‘story’ streams, concentrating on areas of expertise on topics about business, technology, politics and personal development).
What struck me is the contradiction of this description and intention of the overall aim; the language used to explain the aim undermines itself in the misappropriation of the inherent codifiers of the words themselves; just look at the list in order of appearance and the mixed messages that come with it:
subscribed readers; best stories by authors who know their subjects.
Taking a moment to decode this, in all its implications, is its own article, but, in essence, the set up here, is one of a dedicated readership for worthwhile reads, by highly valued authorship: Now that will turn any serious writer’s head worth their salt.
The issue is, it is not about WRITING. It is about INFORMATION. The stories are contextualised to provide for subscription reader: CONTENT.
MEDIUM is taking on commercial media publishing, it is not offering those who have been shaping the“writerly voice” of its platform, a literary platform. A closed number of American-based publications on Medium are currently offered subscription to their own writers and readers.
ALL writers are invited to participate in Medium’s writer partner scheme and are asked to pitch their ‘stories’ alongside ‘content providers’; none of which guarantees payment, but you can only pitch if you apply for the writer partnership program which you can only do as long as you become a subscriber reader.
(Correction: Medium has informed us below in responses that writers can pitch to Medium without becoming a subscriber reader, which I am sure will ease minds and please many. Thank you Your Friends @ Medium. )
Also not everyone has received these Reader Membership / Writer Partnership invitations, leaving multitudes of readers and writers using Medium, in the dark, as to why format and access suddenly is different.
To claim nothing changes outside the paywall is not quite true: I cannot access responses to my posts as the replies increase, forcing me to go directly to that person’s profile and click on their responses tab to read their response and reply to it. The number of stories listed on Medium’s leader page is pared down to five per category, something which substantially diminishes my experience of ‘readership’ and writer engagement, as I try and find people whose work I follow. To say nothing changes, is quite simply disingenuous.
This is the kind of thrown-down gauntlet that leaves so many feeling they’re suddenly in a proverbial chokehold: subscribe or suck it.
Deepening my personal discomfort as a Medium user is how stories and content, content writers and real storytellers are set up against the other in the context of the ‘READER’ : Add to this the vision set out to fix /redress or re- calibrate ‘broken media’ and it’s a linguistic recipe for a ‘medium is the message’-disaster, at the very least.
So, in terms of intention, purpose and the means, what are we independent writers and small press publishers really dealing with here,?
By creating a playing field that will attract names and lesser ones into this ‘new media arena’, Medium can both test the market and create a new media playing field, (defines the game and the rules), while upping its financial portfolio as it inevitably heads bullishly towards ye good olde Wall Street.
Keeping the literary wall of fiction and poetry on the outside of the paywall is the most cost effective way of attracting both readers and writers; ironic for the fact writers already are the majority of readers on Medium.
It makes perfect accounting (albeit ruthless) sense to have its own users fund their own fees, while offering exposure and capturing readership subscription from that very same pool of people. This approach offers Venture Capitalists evidence of Medium ability to capitalise this user-platform value and turn it into a major revenue generator; entrepreneurial ABC.
Propaganda, Power and the Dissident.
As DHH points out in his enlightening essay RECONSIDER, on entrepreneurship;
Part of the problem seems to be that nobody these days is content to merely put their dent in the universe. No, they have to fucking own the universe. It’s not enough to be in the market, they have to dominate it. It’s not enough to serve customers, they have to capture them.
In fact, it’s hard to carry on a conversation with most startup people these days without getting inundated with odes to network effects and the valiance of deferring “monetization” until you find something everyone in the whole damn world wants to fixate their eyeballs on.
In this atmosphere, the term startup has been narrowed to describe the pursuit of total business domination. It’s turned into an obsession with unicorns and the properties of their “success”. A whole generation of people working with and for the internet enthralled by the prospect of being transformed into a mythical creature.
And it seems this very kind of enthrall is perpetuated by the wholesome hyperbole of everything we independent writers and publishers wish of, and perhaps project too onto what we wish Medium to be; that mythical place of custodianship of everything around writing and readership, which we know from bitter experience is pretty much dust in the wind everywhere else. None of which has anything to do with providing content.
Robert Robert Cormack, has twice suggested heading off to Sherwood Forest which, in a world of media monoliths: AMAZON putting the squeeze on writers and publishers; FACEBOOK being in the face of everything but what’s worthwhile, let alone GOOGLE that watches every move you make, has me thinking about the virtue of social banditry.
Who needs Orwell’s BIG BROTHER these days? Nationalised espionage pretty much makes that Orwellian concept archaic.
So, with all the “fencing off of the commons” and with its foreseeable abdication of recognition for literary writers in the future business vision of Medium, where does this leave the rest of us?
As DHH ponders the wherewithall of startups and in particular his company Basecamp, and reaches for the real question of WHY; I got back to considering my own personal Why: And his consideration to dig deeper, to explore the deeper motivation of ‘independence’ takes me beyond the conventional idea of ‘Inspiration’ and into the organic tension of ‘custodial independence’. Why am I an independent poet / publisher?
It is not only, I’ve carved my own eccentric career since the age of 24,after being told by a corporate advertising giant I was ‘un-employable’, or that I walk to the beat of my own artistic drum; as I grow wiser and older, it is about standing up for and a custodial responsibility of, the right to an independent voice. It occurs to me that the nature of the tension created here is that space between the reality of the new reader/writer paywall and the miasmic confusion it scatters as collateral ‘damage’. What I refer to by social banditry and the tension of custodial independence, brought to mind by Robert’s (Robert Cormack) remark about Sherwood Forest and all that is symbolically socially encoded by just those two words: is that choice, to remain true to oneself and do right by oneself and others, even if it incurs criticism. Custodianship of anything valuable invariably leads to tension.
I’ve been irked for years by how Art has effectively lost its social and political voice. What sense would it make for me to buy into everything that runs counter to my inner nature, even if it meant an opportunity perhaps to earn and enter the ‘mainstream’ of something. My independence is simply not for sale in such terms.
As DHH writes;
“ Independence isn’t missed until it’s gone. And when it’s gone, in the sense of having money masters dictate YOUR INCREDIBLE JOURNEY, it’s gone in the vast majority of cases. Once the train is going choo-choo there’s no stopping, no getting off, until you either crash into the mountain side or reach the IPO station at lake liquidity.”
I wanted to make a product and sell it directly to people who’d care about its quality. There’s an incredible connection possible when you align your financial motivations with the service of your users. It’s an entirely different category of work than if you’re simply trying to capture eyeballs and sell their attention, privacy, and dignity in bulk to the highest bidder.
I’m going to pull out another trite saying here: It feels like honest work. Simple, honest work. I make a good product, you pay me good money for it. We don’t even need big words like monetization strategy to describe that transaction because it is so plain and simple even my three year-old son can understand it.
I wanted to put down roots. Long term bonds with coworkers and customers and the product. Impossible to steer and guide with a VC timebomb ticking that can only be defused by a 10–100x return. The most satisfying working relationships I’ve enjoyed in my close to two decades work in the internet business have been those that lasted the longest.
None of which excludes the desire and necessity for wishing to secure financial stability. It is how you approach it that matters. Greed and ambition are false bedfellows of genuine relationships that codify the reciprocity of true business principles, which to me marks the nature of genuine success, regardless of one’s bank balance.
But then, I am not a capitalist at heart. I am a dissident. I can’t buy into the monolithic myth of Bezos’s Amazonian-type world dominance at the expense of the ‘little guy’. It turns my stomach. I’m the independent corner bookstore, the bootstrapping small press committed to craftmanship. I’d rather stand for endless hours crafting a book, at a hand press, with ink stains and swollen legs, than raise millions and employ minions in a campaign to throttle options for all writers and publishers, hold the publishing world to ransom by dictating pricing and charging self publishing writers an arm and a leg for listing their books.
I am no Robin Hood, but I realise my corner of the 100 acre wood is indeed Sherwood Forest. I don’t support Facebook and I will never use Amazon, ever: Not for my own books, but neither for those whom Rare Swan Press publishes. I’d rather do the work myself than give away such an inexcusably large % of a writer’s rightful income just for a listing.
Again, to quote from DHH;
Conformity kills artistry and Art is already rendered voiceless in its commoditization and an investment portfolio. How can you call the status quo to account and ask the kind of questions that have shaped the cultural legacy of humanity, when what you create is devalued into nothing other than a fiscal bet?
I’ve written everything from advertising copy to sonnets and I know one thing for certain: I’m a lifelong apprentice of literature and its language; of its craft and its artistry.
I am not a word-smithing mechanic.
Without money I might be impoverished, but a life without literature and art, I am destitute.
I’ll take Sherwood Forest and its banditry purpose of living a useful life: You’re invited.
With thanks my sincerest thanks and gratitude for the conversation;
Robert Cormack, Michael Haupt, DHH, Keith Parkins, Jeffrey Field, Vanessa Praça-Correa, White Feather, Shahzeb Akhter, Michael Ramsburg, Kathleen Clarke Anderson, Kyle Argento Luvumn Anna Breslin Adam Maldonado Wendi Adair ePeak Giulia Blasi Saul Juan Antonio Cuautle Srinath Paul Reney Stephen M. Tomic Iogo Chirola Peter David Montgomery David Smooke Mike Essig Cristian Randieri, Phd Zac Chapepa north boy Nichole Elliot Nichols John Beck Jan Friman Jessica Semaan Bruce Kunkel Jason Stelzner and everyone who has contributed their concern.
For those who have asked me further about this, please find my two other commentaries at these links;
First essay;
Followed by
My sincerest thanks to everyone. I will answer all responses as soon as possible.
