A Quick Feedium Tip For Sharing Your Work in a More Effective Fashion

If you can read this, you are driving too close.

Most of us Mediumites have seen it before. And if you’ve been a good Feediumite, you probably know better than to do it by now.

It’s annoying.

It’s arrogant.

It’s completely useless.

No, I’m not talking about most of my writing, however applicable that may be.

I’m talking about the selfish posters.

How to Ruin a Good Conversation

You see them in the comments section of a typical discussion.

You find yourself in the middle of a great discussion on how to improve the recipe for peanut butter tuna sandwiches when you see it.²

One person says a brilliant comment. Another replies with a great rebuttal. A third chirps in adding to the mixture.

Then they show up.

They always do.

READ MY WORK. HERE IS MY COMPLETELY UNRELATED LINK ON HOW TO MILK LIZARDS.

I’m sure you know what I mean. I come across it every day here on Medium.

You’ll also constantly see their ilk all over the place on Facebook, Twitter, WordPress, and whatever other waste of time social media platform a now-tech-bro-billionaire has foisted upon society.

I know it bugs you. I also know some of you might be guilty of this very same act. I sure have been to one degree or another in the past.

The Form of the Beast

It doesn’t just come in blatant how-to articles for creating pasteurized green milk either. There are varying forms of offside in this rabbit run.

• Sometimes it will just be a link with no comment.
• Others will be an unrelated lead-in.
• It's occasionally so nonsensical of a comment/link that it can even make you laugh, in a non-good manner.

Last but not least, there’s the almost acceptable version of a long-form well-thought-out comment with not-nearly-enough-dashes that has a strong lead-up to a conclusion — and you have to click on the link to find out what it is.¹

I never click.

Do you?

Rejoice!

But don’t worry, noble reader, for there is another method to the madness of sharing your work. And it might seem even more obvious than you thought.

That’s what I realized after the first time I did it. And now I stick to it.

Just ask.

Do you have a juicy lizard article that’s highly related to the topic of discussion? Just ask if someone wants to see it first.

Are you in the middle of discussing the nefarious ways Al Gore’s Rhythm is messing you up lately and have an answer on how to out-dance the dance machine? Just ask if they want to see it first.

Did someone mistakenly tell you that tuna does not belong anywhere near peanut butter unless both are still canned up in their manufactured prisons of shame? I know this will be hard to resist, but just ask if someone wants to see your article explaining why they’re terribly wrong — instead of just posting it.

See? Simple.

Why?

1. People might actually read it. If you post a random out-of-context link on any comment section I’m talking in — I won’t just not click it. If I remember your name, I will remember the shame. As in — shame on you. And I won’t click your other links ever again if I remember. Luckily for you, I enjoy drinking heavily on occasion so memory isn’t one of my forefronts. Where was I again? Oh yes.
2. If you ask me first — and I say yes — there is a very very very high chance I will at least open your article and skim it. If it’s good, I may even want to read the entire thing.
3. I’ll clap, I might comment, and I might even give the ultra-rare share.
4. I will notch off a few points in the respect book anytime I see your name brush my eyeballs in the future. And I’ll likely want to read more of your work whenever your beautiful name embraces my screen in the future.
5. It’s a nicer way to interact in the hellscape that social media has become.

So just ask first next time.

Or at least give it a try.

Just please stop spamming. It’s not helping your cause and makes you look like an unattractive robot named Zuckerberg.

Wouldn’t you rather look like an unattractive writer named JJ instead?

Food for thought.³

J.J. Pryor

Notes:

1. Hypocritically, I do this all the time with my newsletters. But I’m a dick. If you want to see examples — please click this link and signup!
2. This conversation would be completely irrelevant as you might as well go attempt to create a time machine — it’s more plausible.
3. It’s been unscientifically proven that PB&T’s are literal food for thoughts.
4. I haven’t written in a while after a bit of a rut. Yes, this article was meant to shake off the rust from my fingers. And no, there is no #4 in the article mentioning this note. Until now.⁴ So meta.