My Notes on Medium’s Updated Payment Program

The only constant is change

Aug 07, 2023

I kind of have to laugh.

Going into August, I was pretty excited about the upcoming changes to the Medium Partner Program. Before I say anything else, let me reassert that I think this is the best program for writers you’ll find anywhere. It pays well, and it gives you access to the work of a lot of other great and knowledgeable writers.

As I understood it, the things that were going to be different in August were:

Earning multipliers
Greater focus on quality stories

Now let’s dig into how that played out in the first week of the new program.

Take the time to make a fair evaluation

I checked my earnings after the first day and didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Jason Provencio provided a humorous take here. I laughed to myself (again), and realized I needed to be fair about my expectations versus my assessment. I realized the rubric I was using was this:

My earnings go down—changes are bad
My earnings stay the same—changes are bad
My earnings go up—that’s just what I deserve and it has nothing to do with the changes

Sometimes it’s important to kick some of the rust out of your brain so you can get back to a level playing field and make a fair assessment.

So, I hunkered down to wait and observe.

The boosts changed things

By the end of the week, two of my stories received a boost.

I didn’t nominate these, and I’m always pleased to get a boost. I’d understood that boosts were going to count more in the new system, and that really seems to be the case. Both of these made over $100 in the first few days.

I wrote another story that got over 1K views, Confederates Are American Nazis, although many of those views were external. I always have good luck with stories on An Injustice. Somebody must pick up on stories from there to share on dark web conservative chatrooms because I always get a handful of bizarre comments.

These days when I get a bizarre comment I read two words and go check the profile. If it’s some guy with less than ten followers I just instantly hit block.

Earnings always come in surges on Medium. If my earnings maintain the pace of the first week, I’ll have my all time best month. However, I don’t expect that to happen. I’ll let you know at the end of the month.

Emphasis on read ratio

Going into August, my biggest concern was the multiplier for read ratio (views vs reads). Medium indicated it was going ease its requirements for counting a view as a read.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but my read ratio tends to be low. I think part of that is because my work gets shared on dark web conservative chatrooms where enraged people come to leave comments after reading the title.

Since Medium indicated read ratio was going to be one of the multipliers for earnings, I was hoping to see an increase with the changes. That hasn’t happened:

I actually sent a query to Medium to ask if we could get a read ratio for internal vs external readers. I believe Medium readers are more sophisticated than external readers. If read ratio is a multiplier, I’d prefer they’d use the internal data. I was informed that the idea was under consideration and I think that’s a fair reply (with Medium Day coming up, they’ve got a lot on their plate right now).

I think my read ratio is low because I write long paragraphs (for the internet). A lot of writers use a “kick the can down the road” approach to their medium work. People keep scrolling like a cat pawing at a laser dot. That’s an effective tactic for generating a high read ratio, but you can’t convey any meaningful information that way.

Is low read ratio an indicator of clickbait?

I get that clickbait is bad for the platform, but I think it’s problematic to look at read ratio to determine whether something is clickbait. Sure, readers will jump off clickbait. However, they’ll also jump off an academic article or informative article written by an expert that is too technical.

Yes, writers have an obligation to maintain the interest of their readers. But also, there are a lot of different types of readers. I’d prefer a higher weight be given to the views of educated readers (thus, the internal read ratio suggestion).

But, I also understand that it’s always complicated to make sense of the data that’s available. This is the scientific process. You have to devise a method that helps you determine which numbers indicate clickbait. I feel my work should be considered a known quantity that’s used to calibrate the tool. That is, if your tool suggests that my work is clickbait, there’s something wrong with the tool.

To summarize, my read ratio hasn’t gotten better with the relaxed parameters, but it hasn’t seemed to have hurt my earnings either.

What are your thoughts on the changes?

What always seems to happen is that there’s a huge contingent of people who lament any form of change and demand that the system go back to “how it was.” I think that’s the wrong way to look at it. It’s never going back to “how it was.” But the system will continue to be changed over time—that’s inevitable.

I have no doubt there will be internal changes over the next few months. We’ll see what happens. Be patient, and continue to focus on producing your best work.

When I take a step back, I have to admit that I do feel more empowered to write what I feel are better quality articles for medium. I like adding in the personal elements. I think that makes the stories more entertaining. I have a couple really good ones waiting in the queue that I’m excited for you all to read.

Be sure to sign up for Medium Day. I’m speaking for a half hour starting at 5:30ET (don’t get confused with the time zones). Hope to see you there! Register here and find me.