How Medium Turned Profitable on Behalf of Its Writers
It's official: July'24 was the first profitable month of Medium. How it happened? What are the outlooks? Should you continue to write on Medium? Here's my brutally honest opinion.
It finally happened!
Medium’s long-awaited profitability has arrived in July’24!
Here’s what Tony said on LinkedIn:
We’ll hear more details tomorrow on Medium’s Day. For now, here’s my brutally honest opinion.
How it all started?
It started last year with Tony, in his role of a new CEO aiming to prove himself, promised profitability by May’24.
Bullish, never happened.
So we started facing the greatest fiasco of all times on the platform:
The writer’s earnings dropped. Some writers reported more than 80% decrease in June - July. There were exceptions, some had an increase. Since there’s no official report about the totals, my guess it’s down.
The number of boosted stories dropped significantly. According to the official journal of Medium, we see 21% decrease in July vs. June. My guess, the writers’s earnings decreased no less. Here are the stats:
Now, if you ask Medium, they might say this is because much less stories were published, and boosted v.s total even increased!
Yes, sure, tell me about it! Not buying it, sorry…
We faced delayed payment execution in June.
At the beginning of each month, we started seeing writers getting revoked from the Partner Program. Mostly without explanation, notice or a chance to get reinstated. There are exceptions, some did got their status back. We lost many of the writers in my publication, and recently even one of the editors! This usually happens in the period 1-10th each month, right before the execution of payments. So if you’re among the “lucky winners”, you won’t get paid for what you’ve earned last month…
The distribution rules changed. Instead of recommending writers, Medium now recommends publications. I was on the list of recommended writers in “Writing” topic. In July I was surprised to see I’m not and that there are a lot of publications. This might be ok from Medium’s point of view, since it’s in line with the strategy to move towards more focus on the boost program.
Which brings me to the major problem I want to put more focus on: besides publications, Medium heavily recommends free-to-read stories. This way paid stories get pushed away, so Medium optimizes costs. Even though it doesn’t work toward gaining more paid subscribers, it does help Medium reduce costs.
In a nutshell: everything works towards Medium’s profitability. Is it on behalf of its writers’ earnings? I believe yes, very much so!
The “TikTok Invasion”
I put this in quotations because I believe everything is manufactured. It all started with a
’s story about how she saw a lot of accounts created since May’24 (what a coincidence?!), rapidly growing followers, and engagement. I deep dived and discovered these accounts have a lot of similarities:all with huge followers
all with huge engagement on thier stories
most followers, clappers and commenters are also newly created accounts, also around May
names and story titles all written in sentence case
story images not copyrighted, so not following Medium quality guidelines
writing in one identical style about the same topics, to my expert opinion, written by well-trained AI
all not in the Partner Program, not monetizing via anything - no affiliates, no newsletters, nothing…
a lot of their stories getting recommended by Medium via standard distribution, despite they’re not eligible (not following requirements for standard distribution)
See the exact accounts I checked here. I wrote about it with the (naive) idea of giving a heads-up to Medium. I only got a reply that these writers are genuine accounts, just TikTok users using Medium differently.
Then Zulie from Medium published an interview (heavily edited done by email) with Remi aiming to prove authenticity. It got a lot of pushback. I wasn’t alone.
How can so many writers come to Medium at the exact same time, start writing in the exact same style, about the exact same thing?
I couldn’t wrap my head around it. So I went to TikTok.
The TikTok Research
I wanted to prove Medium right. But I only got even more suspicious. I checked maybe a hundred (if not more) videos:
from these writers,
from other writers commenting
similar videos from the platform
Here’s what I found:
Most of the writers don’t even have engagement on TikTok. The only ones who have some are Remi and the thekidultwriter. Both have some videos from before they started writing on Medium, which are nothing special, not much engagement.
Their TikTok engagement started growing when they started writing on Medium. And it’s nothing viral!
It’s not a gut feeling, I made a research with HypeAuditor. Here’s the engagement of Remi:
The one of the thekidultwriter looks even worse. He started TikTok and Medium at the same time….
I’m fully transparent here, I don’t want my research to get affected from my confirmation bias looking to prove these accounts are fake.
I looked at the audience analysis and I couldn't get a report for the kidultwriter, as he is relatively new to the platform, but I did get for Remi:
I didn’t find what I was looking for - they look genuine. Although I find it strange for all of them to be from the Philippines and just in two age groups.
Then I looked at the videos on her profile. I was surprised to see they are NOT videos! Just slideshows of screenshots of Medium articles.
But look closer! You’ll see only three videos going viral and most of the others are just not.
My guess: her following on TikTok was gained through paid advertising of these 3 videos or through a bot farm - from the ones who create “genuine” accounts.
I can’t prove any of that, but I do have a lot of experience with TikTok, advertising including.
So I looked for signs of my theory in the videos’s comments. Usually, if it was promoted, there are some negative or sarcastic comments. I saw none. But you could delete these comments if you wish.
Then I noticed something else: a lot of the comments were saying they’re happy to find remi (on TikTok) and know her from the Medium app!
Even more are asking where to read these amazing stories. So Medium must be right - they do come from TikTok…
I was confused…
Then I started looking for other videos like these - slideshows of Medium writing. With so many writers coming from TikTok lately this must have become some kind of a new viral format.
Guess what: it didn’t! I had to search extensively to find some of these videos, most of them from new writers coming from Medium. But they are not viral!
Remi is an exception on TikTok.
If you by any change bought it from Zulie that TikTok will bring you massive growth on Medium, don’t waste your time! And don’t trust me. Do your own research! I’m just a person who makes data-driven decisions…
Looking at the comments: all asking for readership on Medium! What a surprise! That’s something more common on social media, something I’m used to seeing.
Out of curiosity, I checked some of these writers on Medium, and guess what? They write differently!
different styles
different setup of the accounts
normal engagement for a new writer
Now, that’s what I call human!
Here are some of the many examples I checked:
After seeing this, the picture started to become clearer.
Especially after I got an anonymous tip, saying Medium is doing what is a common practice for businesses in China. And what this person was hired to do in the past.
The Anonymous Tip
In China (and I guess other countries in Asia) companies hire people to manufacture content on social media to create fake personas with engagement that looks real and authentic. For different purposes, mostly money.
How it works:
a real person generates content to fabricate the online persona
bot farms are creating huge engagement to create artificial virality
the account gets promoted by the algorithm, gains traction and starts getting real audience
Viola! You have an authentic person gone viral out of the blue.
And it doesn’t have to be a fake persona. The name and the personality can be taken from a real human, which can also be the same running the show.
As for the bot farms - they can definitely look real. With human-like commenting, liking, following, interaction, etc. Software made. AI-enhanced. The type that can trick tools like Hypeauditor into stating the audience is authentic.
This can bend algorithms, influence large audiences, and eventually generate cash. Some people suggest it can bring companies down sucking the cash out of them.
Combine the above with AI.
It’s no secret that AI influencers (which are basically fake personas) are now taking the business of real creators on social media.
It’s no secret that companies from the western world are creating thier own AI influencers to save money from working with real ones.
There are AI influencer agencies now.
What it takes to create a TikTok influencer who writes on Medium?
In Medium’s case - to bring new traffic from TikTok on Medium aiming to convert them to paying readers.
Today I saw another story on Medium from a Philippine writer Bella, asking Tony what he thinks about Zulie’s story. Tony finally replied! The usual fluff, but Bella was so kind to explain him in details how the bot farms work in the Philippines.
Back to Remi.
Yes, she and her “favorite writers” can all be real. Genuine. Authentic.
And the above explains how.
But where’s the money since they’re not in the Partner Program?
Enter the New 77 Countries in the Partner Program
The Philippines was just recently added in the Partner Program by Medium. Coincidence? Maybe…
The truth is, this was announced one year ago.
Now Remi & co can start earning. Easily. Takes just one click of the enrollment button.
Connecting the Dots
I’m now wondering, as we were discussing with
:Is Medium really that blind to see what’s coming at it? And the scale of it?
Or is Medium behind this all?
I have no answers.
But my thoughts are gravitating around the idea of
: Why are all these countries enrolled in the Partner Program? These countries have stronger buying power, you can buy more with fewer dollars. New writers from these countries will be happy with lower earnings.More happy writers. More paying members.
Sounds like a viable strategy.
If that is planned, I have to admit it’s a master plan. Genius. Honestly.
I myslef have been participating in the undertaking of turning a large company from loss generating to profitability. Twice.
And I can tell you, it’s not an easy task.
You have to kick some asses. Something you have to kick your sales (in Meidum’s case - the writers), but just enough to make sure the net sales are positive. Sometimes you have to kick your customers (in Medium’s case subscribers), but just enough to make sure the net revenue is positive.
Since this was announced a year ago, it looks like a calculated move.
I’m just wondering are the bots are part of it. If not, Medium will be facing the greatest challenge of its existence.
What’s in it for us: writers from US and Europe?
Many writers started leaving the platform, coming here on Substack. To be honest I’m also considering. What are the outlooks?
Based on the facts above, I’m starting to believe Medium wants us to leave if we want to. Even pushing. With all this prosecution.
Tony in his answer to Bella said:
“The only reason any of us have an audience to write for here is because of the diversity of writers and writing styles of our community. Each writer we add and embrace makes us bigger and stronger. Writers judging who is and who isn’t a real writer has the opposite effect. That makes us smaller and weaker.”
Anyone who speaks up, showing the patterns, raising concerns is now blamed for judging. Unwanted.
This is the new life of Medium.
I continue to ask the questions, but I continue to get ignored. I get just silence. A loud and clear silence, one that’s shouting “LEAVE”.
P.S. Looking at Remi’s post on TikTok showing off Zulie’s story, I noticed what she wrote: “we made it”. I can’t help but wonder who’s “WE”?
Thanks for being with me on this!
Yana