Mark, great piece and very insightful! I find this paragraph particularly fascinating. I bet your piece was a good read; but for me it’s just really hard to imagine folks were once getting recognized and appreciated so easily. I dearly appreciate the folks who choose to follow me, read my stuff, and encourage me with hearts and comments; I thought that’s what Medium would be about — encouragement — so I do try to do as much of that as I can with the time I have. However, I sometimes feel general encouragement is purposely withheld, and I don’t know why. Well, actually I think I do know why, but thinking about it makes me feel pretty bummed.

Anyway, I don’t think you sound like a cry baby at all. And I have been enjoying pieces of yours that pop up in my feed. Quite a few of the pieces that grab me most these days are those with relatively few hearts, or those written by newer or less active folks with fewer followers. So, yes, please, keep writing away, keep encouraging others! We may not be very visible, for whatever reason, but I think a lot of us are out here trying to do the same thing. :)