Why I’m Low on Medium

I’ve experimented with Medium for a few months. There are things to like: ease of use, clean design, and potential for promotion & community. It’s fine if you’re an occasional content dabbler. Though I know they are still in development, it’s clear the platform is built around them, not you.

Some serious negatives:

1) Their login is on every page, even for custom domains. 
2) You don’t get emails from the people who join or sign up because of your content. They keep and use those addresses for themselves. 
3) They promote other people’s posts on your pages, prioritizing driving traffic to the platform, not you.
4) There’s no way to create premium, subscriber-only content. And if there were, bet the house you’d have no access to that user’s data.
5) It does not support podcasting or rich media hosting.

If you’re serious about your content and branding, know that Medium is built for a VC-exit — not for the user. It’s a shame, too. People like me would pay for the above features and Medium’s ease of use. Self-hosted Wordpress is a nightmare — dealing with hosting, design, plugins, and back-end BS. But for versatility, it’s still the only game in town.