Medium Wins
Because here I am
John Gruber responding to Ev Williams’s Medium 1.0 announcement:
I still don’t get what Medium is. These new features certainly look pretty, but they make me more confused than ever regarding what Medium, as a whole, is.
I too, have no clue what the hell this place is. I don’t enjoy writing in the backend, the site’s design isn’t to my taste and, of primary importance, I don’t much like the content I read here.
For as long as Medium has been live, and more (but only just) so since flinging their doors open earlier this year, any medium.com URL I follow points to work I generally regret taking the time to read.
But look at the typography and full-width images!
The design of Medium seems to be what defines it. Medium posts, by design,¹ are instantly recognizable from the moment you land on a story. Thus far I have found this to mean I’m about to read some navel-gazing op-ed on modern design trends. But that’s good for the platform; I have a strong relationship with Medium’s brand, just in the wrong direction (for now).
No question: it’s a pretty site and it works well for most people. The backend is intuitive (unless you’re used to an offline text editor like myself, but I recognize that I’m part of the past, not the future) and the site appears to be scaling well. It can handle (presumably) heavy traffic without crashing out while you’re writing. This is a powerful modern publishing product.
But why should you be here?
Medium’s dirty little (open) secret is that some contributors are paid to publish here on a freelance basis. Director of Content Kate Lee, back in April:
What we’ve been doing is paying some contributors at competitive freelance rates. As for why: Our goal is to make Medium the best platform possible for everyone to share great ideas or stories. This should certainly include those whose profession is doing so.
In other words, we need to build a sustainable business that provides writers a variety of rewards — from intellectual growth to influence to, at times, money.
Descending order of importance, natch.²
You may have noticed some big names writing here on Medium. Are they getting paid? Probably. Which posts are compensated for? Who knows. But that there’s the magic. A small investment in a couple of headliners could sell the masses on the brand.
What if I told you you could be published alongside writers from (but not in) The New Yorker³ for the low low price of free? In a nut, that’s Medium: a slick, magazine-like publishing and reading platform that writers should be so lucky to contribute to.
But I want that sweet sweet typography!
Design and publishing are hard. Medium wants to be a place for folks without a home on the web to deposit their ideas before they realize they might actually be worth something. Here’s Ev:
While it continues to be more and more efficient to put media-type stuff out there, we think there are big improvements to be made in a particular type of media “stuff”: That which is not necessarily personal and not necessarily news. That which we might just call ideas.
All ideas under one tent. Good for readers. Great for Medium.
His closing from the same piece:
You need a place to start. So our goal is to help people pay attention to the most valuable stuff first and to have the best ideas win.
Winning is writing for free on someone else’s platform. Like I just did.
- No pun intended?
- That “at times” is really something, isn’t it?
- Or whatever.