Frequently Asked Questions
ILLUMINATION’s Process and Procedures
Answering your questions about ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications
New writer inquiries and applications for Illumination Integration Publications are through the registration portal. Please review the onboarding pack before submitting your stories. I look forward to supporting your stories on Medium.
New writers, please check this new editorial update including a comprehensive checklist aiming to improve the quality of your writing and increase the chance of visibility and building your audience on Medium.
Dear New Writer,
Welcome!
I founded Illumination based on diversity, inclusion, and collaboration principles on 19 March 2020, which became a significant publication loved by thousands of writers and readers on Medium.
ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications support various levels of writers, from the absolute beginners to the most accomplished ones. Our publications are inclusive and diverse, supporting 21,000+ contributors.
Every ethical writer is welcome to join my publications. Our editors don’t censor content as long as your stories meet Medium guidelines. I created this publication as a giveback activity to society.
As owner and chief editor of Illumination Integrated Publications, I answer frequently asked questions linking to relevant articles in this post. All writers can contact me via our workspace or my social media connection.
My goal is your success. Believing in diversity and inclusion principles, my doors are always open to help you regardless of your background, age, gender, race, religion, philosophy, diet, and other life factors.
If you are a reader of my stories, I archive my personal stories on EUPHORIA and publication-related stories on Illumination’s Blog. I also recommend writers create their own publications.
So please contact me when you need help on our Slack workspace. I helped hundreds of writers to create their publications.
Beginners of Illumination might start by reviewing the onboarding pack.
If you cannot find what you want in this article and the onboarding pack, you might check the attached collection compiled by editors. It includes many guiding articles I have created for new writers since 2019.
You might check relevant ones for your needs. I cover writing from multiple angles as a prolific writer and published author with four decades of experience.
I keep this piece active by updating it as we make changes.
The first rule of Illumination is:
Every New Writer Must Read and Understand the Photo Handingly Policy Before Starting as It Is Critical for Timely Publishing of Your Stories.
WARNING: Writers failing to meet our photo handling policy will be removed from publications. This is our biggest problem wasting the precious time of our volunteer editors and causing publishing delays.
What is the purpose of ILLUMINATION?
ILLUMINATION aims to create a novel collaborative content culture with cross-pollination among the writers.
We aim to bring writers, editors, and readers to create a social circle of content development, dissemination, and consumption with joint effort.
Our aim is to empower our writers to improve their skills and connections, enabling them to gain visibility for their content and build their audience on Medium.
Our publication aims to amplify the messages of our writers. Our focus is on our writers' success and giving our readers an excellent reading experience.
As the founder of the publication, I shared my vision in this first invitation story in March 2020.
How can I apply to be a writer at ILLUMINATION?
Please leave a message on this webform providing your Medium account ID.
Where can I find publication-related resources?
What are the contact details for the ILLUMINATION?
For your inquiries, please use this link to record your request.
What are the ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications?
You might find the links to our publications in the following list.
ILLUMINATION ILLUMINATION-Curated ILLUMINATION’ S MIRROR ILLUMINATION Book Chapters Technology Hits SYNERGY Readers Hope Illumination Videos and Podcasts Illumination Gaming ILLUMINATION’s Blog Lampshade of Illumination Euphoria
Do you have a checklist for new writers?
This checklist is essential for new writers to review before submitting their stories to our publications.
How can my stories gain visibility in ILLUMINATION?
Please check this guide to learn about writing viral articles.
You might explore our curated collections.
How can I increase our writing income?
How can I become a top writer soon?
What is Slack, and why do you use it?
Slack is a communication tool that brings our writers together to socialize and collaborate.
This article provides an introduction to Slack.
One of our writers Jay Toran created a story articulating our community values and how Slack can be used by writers effectively.
How can I request access to Slack?
Please use this link to record your request pointing “Request for Slack”.
What is your photo handling policy?
What do you mean by ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications?
We have several publications edited by a group of volunteer editors. We offer extended services to our writers on Slack. They can easily transfer their stories among multiple publications. They can also amplify their stories using short forms.
What is the purpose of SYNERGY?
The purpose of SYNERGY is specific. It is dedicated to freelance writers and bloggers who want to convert their blogs to Medium stories. This publication has a strategic and entrepreneurial focus. It aims to empower writers by creating synergy with collaboration.
What is the purpose of Technology Hits?
We aim to bring writers with backgrounds from all aspects of technology and create eclectic stories which can offer something for everyone. I have a connection with and access to thousands of writers on Medium and other platforms.
What is the purpose of ILLUMINATION Book Chapters?
We offer three unique values to writers.
1 — Published authors can gain new readers via their repurposed book chapters. They can also earn income from their published content on their Medium.
2 — Published authors can gain new followers and beta readers who can provide feedback on their manuscripts.
3 — Aspiring writers can gain create manuscripts derived from their published stories. They can transfer them into the ILLUMINATION Book Chapters, obtain reader reviews, and publish them as books later.
How can we access chapters published on ILLUMINATION Book Chapters?
Where are the submission guidelines?
We provide the guidelines in the onboarding pack.
Publication Conduct Guidelines in the attached story.
You may also check our starter kit for new writers.
What is the link to the ILLUMINATION publication?
You can view our publication from this link.
Where can we find articles related to ILLUMINATION?
All writer resources and articles related to ILLUMINATION are hosted in the ILLUMINATION’s Blog. Here is the link.
Who are your editors?
You can check the list of our editors from this link.
You can read the bios of our editors from this story.
How can we submit articles to ILLUMINATION?
Please see attached story by Timothy Key.
Do you accept animated GIFs in stories?
No, we don’t. Our readers don’t like animated gifs, so they don’t add any value to your stories. We explained other reasons in our photo handling policy.
Do you accept AI generated images?
Yes we do. You need to caption the image pointing out that it was created by an AI tool and preferably point out its name.
Do you accept AI generated content?
We only accept AI generated content in our new publication the Lampshade of Illumination which is designed for this purpose. Readers of our other publications don’t want us to publish them so we honor their request.
Please review the publishing policy for the Lampshade of Illumination.
How can we access older stories written by ILLUMINATION writers?
We distributed daily stories to our readers in article and email format. You can access all distributed stories from this link. This includes writers' names mapped to articles to make connection easy.
We create many collections. Here are some samples.
Sample Curated Collections for New Readers
You might find links to recently featured stories by the ILLUMINATION Amplifier.
Hand-Picked Articles #181, Hand-Picked Articles #182, Hand-Picked Articles #183, Hand-Picked Articles #184, Hand-Picked Articles #185, Hand-Picked Articles #186, Hand-Picked Articles #187, Hand-Picked Articles #188, Hand-Picked Articles #189, Hand-Picked Articles #190, Hand-Picked Articles #191, Hand-Picked Articles #192, Hand-Picked Articles #193, Hand-Picked Articles #194, Hand-Picked Articles #203, Hand-Picked Articles #206
Here is a new collection.
Collections created by ILLUMINATION-Curator.
ILLUMINATION Reading Club, Curated Book Chapters of Illumination #01, Outstanding Stories — Volume 86, Outstanding Stories — Volume 87, Outstanding Stories — Volume 88, Outstanding Stories — Volume 89, Outstanding Stories — Volume 90, Outstanding Stories — Volume 91.
Collections from ILLUMINATION main.
Curated Collection #132, Curated Collection #131, Curated Collection #130, Curated Collection #129, Curated Collection #128, Curated Collection #133, Curated Collection #134.
How can we access daily editorial bulletins?
Daily editorial bulletins created by Dr Mehmet Yildiz can be accessed from the attached link.
How can we access featured stories of ILLUMINATION?
We started indexing daily featured stories in a collection.
Can we submit published articles to ILLUMINATION?
We prefer draft submissions to give better visibility to the stories of our writers; however, as an exception, we accept published articles too.
Do you censor content while publishing?
No, we don’t. We respect writers’ content, embrace diversity, and publish them as long as they meet Medium policies.
Where can I find the BIOs of your writers?
Our writers submit a story about their background and writing practices. We keep them in the attached article.
Where can I find the interviews you conduct with your writers?
You can check the interviews that I conducted with our writers in the attached story.
If you are a writer on ILLUMINATION and would like to be interviewed, please send a request via this link with title of “Interview Request”.
What is your publishing commitment?
We strive to publish submitted articles to ILLUMINATION within 24 hours. Our current success rate is 8 hours. Any delays are beyond our control and are mainly caused by partial submissions not adhering to the policies of Medium.
What causes publishing delays?
The biggest delay is caused by not captioning photos in stories. Since we are diligent in copyrights and intellectual property protection, our publication policy is to provide credits to photos in all stories.
If you don’t caption your article, you may receive a note from our editors, such as
“Before publishing your article, you will need to add an attribution for your photo to verify copyright permission. For more info: https://readmedium.com/why-all-the-fuss-about-captions-for-photos-bead27ea19c3. Reply to this note after making the changes. Thanks!”
When you receive this private message from our editors, you need to caption your photos and respond back to the message. Our publishing process is fast and reliable as we have editors in every time zone regularly checking submissions. We love to publish your stories so that they gain visibility immediately.
How do you distribute your daily articles?
I create a daily distribution list. You can find our distribution list from a single story. We also send these lists via newsletter to our followers.
How can we find featured articles of ILLUMINATION?
You can access all our featured articles from this single story.
What is the purpose of ILLUMINATION-Curated?
You can find several articles explaining the purpose of ILLUMINATION-Curated, which is a special collection for ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications.
How can we find your curated articles from ILLUMINATION?
You can access all our curated articles from this single story.
How can I access daily distribution lists from ILLUMINATION-Curated?
How can we subscribe ILLUMINATION YouTube channel?
Do you have any writer testimonials about ILLUMINATION?
Yes, we collected them in the attached story.
What do you mean by cross-pollination for writers?
Check the attached article for details.
What was the reason for the initiation of ILLUMINATION?
The main reason is to create a collaborative content development, dissemination, and consumption community. Details are explained in the attached article.
What is the Vision for ILLUMINATION?
Our vision for ILLUMINATION is to be among the top 10 publications on Medium from visibility perspectives internally and externally with a collaborative and concerted effort in the next 12 months.
What is the strategy of ILLUMINATION?
Curate insightful content from a diverse group of writers which appeal to a wide range of content consumers.
Create a review team to improve the quality of articles for extended distributions in various prominent science, technology, art, business, and other quality content forums and platforms.
Develop a supportive culture based on fusion principles, reciprocity, an act of kindness, and mentoring. Share content with innovative ways in Medium ecosystem.
Use agile collaboration tools, e.g. Slack and multiple social media platforms, e.g. LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Quora, Pinterest, for content distribution externally and bring more Medium subscribers.
What are the content domains?
We are open to all legal content adhering to Medium content guidelines from various disciplines and domains.
Due to Medium publication constraints, we have only seven tabs covering Science, Technology, Philosophy, Business, Poetry, Fiction, and Personal Experience. We work around Medium’s limitations.
To solve the problem, we are working on some creative presentation techniques and methods.
What are the common topics used in ILLUMINATION?
Based on reader feedback, the following are common topics that our writers focus on: Some key topics based on reader feedback are Self, Personal Improvement, Technology, Sports, Music, Film, Gaming, Food, Marketing, Humor, Work, Fitness, Nutrition, Education, Sexuality, Health, Healthcare, Politics, Environment, Spirituality, Productivity, Neuroscience, Economy, Business, Leadership, Mental Health, Society, Cannabis, Psychedelics, Coronavirus, Addictions, Diversity, Culture, Food, Family, Parenting, Social Media, Race, LGBTQI, Philosophy, Psychology, Writing, Poetry, and fiction.
What is the governance model?
As a community, our writers and editors make decisions based on member consensus. As we are in growth mode, we keep our governance dynamic and flexible. We will define our governance model in the next phases.
What are the values of ILLUMINATION?
Our core values are Diversity, Fusion, Synergy, and Serendipity.
Our other values are:
courage, honesty, integrity, reliability, empathy, compassion, transparency, fairness, responsibility, accountability, ownership, leadership, entrepreneurship, passion, discipline, joy, modesty, humility, confidence, improvement, quality, excellence, simplicity, impact, respect.
Our values and their importance are explained in the attached article.
How to be a prolific writer on ILLUMINATION?
Guidance is provided in the attached article.
How to improve quality writing on ILLUMINATION?
Guidance is provided in the attached article.
How does the ILLUMINATION community deal with adversity?
We turn adversity into serendipity. Guidance is provided in the attached article.
How do writers deal with negative criticism?
We embrace feedback. We don’t take criticism as personal. It is essential for our growth. Guidance on dealing with negative criticism is provided in the attached article.
How do ILLUMINATION writers create growth on Medium?
Guidance is provided in the attached article.
What is the innovation agenda for the ILLUMINATION community?
Guidance is provided in the attached article.
What is social media for content strategy & marketing?
Guidance is provided in the attached article.
What is the importance of promotion for ILLUMINATION writers?
Guidance is provided in the attached article.
How do you facilitate timely publishing?
We assigned multiple editors from various geographies to publish submitted articles on a timely basis. A list of our editors is provided under the next question.
Simple Guideline for Editors
- Each article should have an appropriate photo.
- Articles cannot contain any illegal materials.
- No harassment towards individuals - internal or external
- We don’t change the content; however, if there are over grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, or typos, we correct them and inform the writer via a private message.
- Our editors don’t embarrass writers for their errors publicly. We contact writers privately.
The following section provides list of editors and writers provided as a reference for our publication. We don’t send unnecessary and unwanted alerts to our followers. If you want to be added or removed please send a request using this link.
How can we link our Twitter handle to a Medium account?
Please see the attached story with step by step guide on this. This is very important for your stories to be tweeted easily by your readers.
What are canonical names?
Who are ILLUMINATION editors?
Here are our recent editorial profiles.
You can read some editor bios from the attached link.
We add new editors as the demands grow. The updated list can be obtained from this link.
What is the role of an editor in ILLUMINATION?
ILLUMINATION Editors are not traditional editors like in other publications.
Our editors are more harvesters and curators of knowledge. Our editors search for insights, wisdom, and meaning hidden in the Medium ecosystem and bring the articles to light on the ILLUMINATION publication.
Some of those articles may require an update. Editors arrange with the writers of those articles. This is a case-by-case situation. Some articles can be published as-is, and some of them may require a minor update.
Some of our editors volunteered to proofread, edit, and format articles for new writers. However, this is not a typical role for our editors.
Who are ILLUMINATION writers?
ILLUMINATION has 16,000+ writers. It is not possible to provide a list here. I keep a maximum of ten days of new writers to give them a chance to review our publication details.
You can explore some of our writers from this story.
Do you support short-form stories?
Yes, we do. Details are in these stories.
[Previous entries were deleted to keep this document concise as we have now over 16,000 writers.]
Who are the top writers on ILLUMINATION?
You can find our top writers from the attached link.
How can writers join the Slack channel?
You can request an invitation to Slack from this link. Please type Request for Slack on the heading.
What is the purpose of the Slack channel?
New writers are invited to join our Slack to have a chat and collaborate with other inspiring writers. We discuss editorial matters, Medium policies, content quality, and overall writing skills improvement.
What are some of the writing initiatives on ILLUMINATION?
We have several writing challenges and prompts.
A 30-day short story challenge as described in the attached article.
A 30-day quality article writing challenge to increase the chance of distributing to the topics as described in the attached article.
You can find writing challenges and prompts in the attached file.
What are the ILLUMINATION Social Media Links?
We share our stories on the following platforms. We encourage our new writers to join and follow these links.
What is the Twitter List for ILLUMINATION writers?
Our writers subscribe to this Twitter List to share their content on Twitter: https://twitter.com/i/lists/1241994806374481922?show=top
What is the Facebook page for ILLUMINATION?
Our Facebook page is https://www.facebook.com/MediumIllumination/
How do we submit articles to the ILLUMINATION publication?
Check this link provided by Medium.
Specific instructions to submit articles to ILLUMINATION can be found from this story.
How to stop unnecessary alerts and notifications?
Unlike other publications, we recommend submitting published articles to reduce the number of alerts to the editors.
What is the archival plan?
We plan to archive articles after 12 months. They will still be accessible from the archival tab. This approach can make the publication a knowledge source. We may re-assess this plan and announce it when we decide on this.
How can we access all articles distributed to the readers?
Do you have the criteria to be a writer on ILLUMINATION?
Any Medium member can join ILLUMINATION.
What is your expectation from your writers apart from submitting articles?
We expect our writers to engage in the publication and support other writers for the visibility of their articles. In other words, our writers are also avid readers and content sharers.
Why is Medium membership important, and what is your view on writers’ return on investment (ROI)?
The attached article provides compelling reasons for subscribing to Medium as paid member to reap the benefits in the form of ROI and SROI.
Index of Resources for ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications
Publication Conduct Guidelines
Publication Conduct Guidelines Rules of engagement and cross-pollination at three levels
Process and Procedures Anything you want to know about ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications
Copyright Matters Zero tolerance to plagiarism on ILLUMINATION
Use Of Affiliate Links On Medium Guidance to writers who need to use affiliate links in stories
How to Survive and Thrive on Medium Essential guide to new writers
A Practical Guide for Writers: My collection for writing and writer performance on Medium
Improve the Quality of Your Stories
Essential Checklist for Writers Improve quality and readability of your stories
How to Increase Your Income
The Beginner’s Guide to Write Viral Articles & Blogs Learn 17 proven techniques and unique metrics
Create Visibility of Your Stories
100 Day Challenge For New Writers How to grow and become a top writer on Medium in three months
Invitation To A Writing Challenge Share your concerns and aspirations in a story
Storybooks and Indexing Publications They work. Here is the evidence.
Short-Form Stories Not For Income But For Visibility. Think Of Them As A Tripwire
ILLUMINATION Poetry Club An invitation to poets to collaborate for productive fun
Mentoring on ILLUMINATION Peer support is essential for success.
To create further visibility of your work, you can join our Slack workspace and collaborate with other fellow writers. We currently have around 12,000 members. You can share your story links on these two channels.
#post-your-own-writing-here and #chosen-for-further-distribution
Publication Specific Information
Purpose of Synergy And how to publish your stories in this publication
SYNERGY on Medium Upon reader request, we renamed Passive Income for Writers publication
Introduction to Technology Hits Scope, overview, and participation methods
ILLUMINATION Book Chapters: A publication giving voice to published authors on Medium
Learn About ILLUMINATION-Curated Essential articles about ILLUMINATION-Curated publication
Paradigm Shift in Content Curation, Distribution, and Marketing
Self-Presented Collections Annotated stories by writers of ILLUMINATION-Curated
ILLUMINATION’S MIRROR A publication created to address Medium constraints for editors
Testimonials for ILLUMINATION Thoughts and sentiments of ILLUMINATION writers.
Collection of Featured Stories
Stories on ILLUMINATION-Curated — All Volumes Easy access to curated and outstanding stories
Reading List #3 — Technology Hits Selected stories for enjoyment of tech readers
Sample Book Chapters Discover 70+ published authors on ILLUMINATION Book Chapters
Top 100 Trending Stories at ILLUMINATION-Curated
Health and Fitness
Mental Health
Education & Learning
Education and Learning From Many Aspects
Love & Relationships
Leadership
The World Needs Passionate & Compassionate Leaders
Entrepreneurship
Do You Want to Become A Sexy Entrepreneur?
Business
Business Collection: A Mini MBA Bundle
Freelancing
The Power of Freelancing for Writers
Writing
Featured Stories About “Writing” From The Top Writers of SYNERGY
Artificial Intelligence
Top Stories About Artificial Intelligence
Top AI Stories on Technology Hits
Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)
NFT Story Collection on ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications
Cryptocurrencies
How Storytellers Articulate Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain
Featured Stories by Editors
Sample Book Chapters Discover 70+ published authors on ILLUMINATION Book Chapters
Index of Published Book Chapters Easy access to chapters for readers on Medium
How to Use Social Media Platforms
How to Get Started with Quora and Amplify Your Medium Stories
How to Get Started with Pinterest and Amplify Your Medium Stories
Writer and Editor Biographies
Curated Writer Bios Learn about contributing writers of ILLUMINATION written by their pen
Interviews with Writers Featuring inspiring writers of ILLUMINATION
Meet Top Writers on ILLUMINATION Featuring writers with top writer status writing for ILLUMINATION
Six Reasons Writers Need Bios The most compelling one is visibility.
Thank you for reading my perspectives. I wish you a healthy and happy life.
As a new reader, you might check my holistic health and well-being stories reflecting on my reviews, observations, and decades of sensible experiments. I write about health as it matters. I believe health is all about homeostasis.
Sample Health Improvement Articles for New Readers
I write about various hormones and neurotransmitters such as dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, GABA, acetylcholine, norepinephrine, adrenaline, glutamate, and histamine.
One of my goals as a writer is to raise awareness about the causes and risk factors of prevalent diseases that can lead to suffering and death for a large portion of the population.
To raise awareness about health issues, I have written several articles that present my holistic health findings from research, personal observations, and unique experiences. Below are links to these articles for easy access.
Metabolic Syndrome, Type II Diabetes, Fatty Liver Disease, Heart Disease, Strokes, Obesity, Liver Cancer, Autoimmune Disorders, Homocysteine, Lungs Health, Pancreas Health, Kidneys Health, NCDs, Infectious Diseases, Brain Health, Dementia, Depression, Brain Atrophy, Neonatal Disorders, Skin Health, Dental Health, Bone Health, Leaky Gut, Leaky Brain, Brain Fog, Chronic Inflammation, Insulin Resistance, Elevated Cortisol, Leptin Resistance, Anabolic Resistance, Cholesterol, High Triglycerides, Metabolic Disorders, Gastrointestinal Disorders, Thyroid Disorders, Anemia, Dysautonomia, cardiac output, and major disorders.
I also wrote about valuable nutrients. Here are the links for easy access:
Lutein/Zeaxanthin, Phosphatidylserine, Boron, Urolithin, taurine, citrulline malate, biotin, lithium orotate, alpha-lipoic acid, n-acetyl-cysteine, acetyl-l-carnitine, CoQ10, PQQ, NADH, TMG, creatine, choline, digestive enzymes, magnesium, zinc, hydrolyzed collagen, nootropics, pure nicotine, activated charcoal, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B1, Vitamin D, Vitamin K2, Omega-3 Fatty Acids, N-Acetyl L-Tyrosine, Cod Liver Oil, and other nutrients to improve metabolism and mental health.
Disclaimer: My posts do not include professional or health advice. I document my reviews, observations, experience, and perspectives only to provide information and create awareness.
I publish my lifestyle, health, and well-being stories on EUPHORIA. My focus is on metabolic, cellular, mitochondrial, and mental health. Here is my collection of Insightful Life Lessons from Personal Stories.
If you enjoy writing and storytelling, you can join Medium, NewsBreak, and Vocal as a creator to find your voice, reach out to a broad audience, and monetize your content.
You may also check my blog posts about my articles and articles of other writers contributing to my publications on Medium. I share them on my website digitalmehmet.com. Here is my professional bio. You can contact me via weblink.
You might join my publications on Medium as a writer by sending a request via this link. 21K+ writers contribute to my publications for readers of this platform. You might find more information about my professional background.
As a content developer and reader, you might join Medium, Vocal Media, NewsBreak, Medium Writing Superstars, Writers League, Writing Paychecks, WordPress, and Thinkers360 with my referral links. This post includes affiliate links.
If you enjoy reading, you may join Medium with my referral link for limitless access to my stories and other writers.
