I’m Using My Medium Earnings To Read My Favorite Writers on Substack

An ode to diversification

digital art by author

I’ve made it my own personal rule not to write about Medium since I got here 5 years ago. But I’ve put a lot of time and energy into this platform over the last year or so, and I need to get a few things off my chest.

There isn’t a platform on the internet that owes us anything. Medium doesn’t owe us money or attention or accolades or recognition. We are its product, plain and simple.

Most of the money I’ve made here has gone back into the publishing world in one way or another. KiKi and I used our earnings and published a literary journal a few months ago and will do so again soon. We also started a podcast that we’re looking forward to resuming.

For a while, I used my Medium earnings to pay for my McSweeney's Patreon. I loved the idea of paying directly for the content I want, and the idea of paying individual writers directly feels better than putting money into a pool where people arbitrarily decide who gets it and who doesn’t.

The bottom line is that I’m tired. I’m tired of editing, publishing, and grinding away. I’m tired of the game. The rules constantly change right under our noses with nary a word about it from on high. At times it feels like playing the lottery or the shell…