Summary

The author was suspended from Medium for a day due to a negative review article that was flagged, potentially for violating Medium's rules against gratuitously harmful content, but the suspension was later found to be a mistake caused by the spam filter.

Abstract

On October 11th, 2021, the author discovered their Medium account was under investigation and subsequently suspended. The suspension appeared to be related to an article they published in the Illumination publication, which was a negative review of a website the author had previously been a part of. The author, concerned about the potential violation of Medium's rules against harmful or abusive content, contacted Medium support for clarification and deleted the article in question. After approximately 24 hours, Medium acknowledged the suspension was an error caused by their spam filter and restored the author's account, also ensuring future content would bypass the filters. The incident led the author to re-read Medium's rules, diversify their content submission platforms by joining Vocal, and decide against re-submitting the problematic review to avoid future risks.

Opinions

The author was initially worried that they might have offended someone or engaged in hate speech, but upon reflection, believed the suspension was due to a negative review article.
The author found Medium's rules to be clear and recognized that their article could be seen as gratuitously harmful, which prompted them to delete it proactively.
Despite the inconvenience, the author appreciated Medium's prompt response and apology once the error was identified.
The suspension served as a wake-up call for the author to not rely solely on Medium for content submission and to be more cautious with future content.
The author values their presence on Medium, especially considering the recent growth in their stats and earnings, and is therefore willing to forego re-publishing the controversial review to maintain their standing on the platform.

Medium Rules

I Got Suspended From Medium For a Day — Why Did This Happen?

2 important lessons I learned from being banned for 24 hours

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels. Filtered with Canva.

On the afternoon of Monday 11th October 2021, I logged into Medium to see this:

“This account is under investigation or was found in violation of the Medium Rules” was not something I wanted to see.

Had somebody reported me?

I immediately started to think of all the things I could have said on here recently that someone might have taken offence to.

Sure, sometimes I say things that some people disagree with, but I try not to deliberately offend anyone or engage in any hate talk. And sure, some of my more creative stories contain some crazy and shocking things, but I always include a warning at the beginning.

Then it dawned on me!

The suspension coincided with one of my articles being published in Illumination. It was an in-depth negative review of a website I used to belong to. In that article, I detailed all the things I didn’t like about it, so this must have been reported by someone or tripped Medium’s filter.

I immediately re-read Medium’s rules, and there is a bit in there about this type of content:

“Reviewing businesses or products in a gratuitously harmful or abusive manner.”

In all fairness, that could describe what I had written.

I contacted Medium, asking what the issue was. After a few hours, I hadn’t received a reply, so I went ahead and deleted the article anyway. I sent another message saying I had deleted it, and also that I was keen to rectify any issues so I could continue contributing to Medium.

The following morning, there was still no reply from Medium, but I’m on UK time and they’re in California, so I’m 8 hours ahead.

So, I kept myself busy by signing up for Vocal, reading every word of their guidelines, and submitting some of my longer articles there.

Then late afternoon on Tuesday 12th October (about 24 hours after the suspension), I finally received a message from Medium saying:

Hello,

It looks like your Medium account was mistakenly caught in our spam filter. I have now restored your account and all your posts. We apologize for this inconvenience.

I have set your account to bypass the filters going forward.

Thanks, Trust & Safety

HALLELUJAH!

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels. Edited with Canva.

So, everything’s back to normal again now, although I lost a day’s worth of views.

But there are two good things that came from this:

It caused me to re-read Medium’s rules and make a mental note to be more careful in future.
I realised it’s best to have more than one place to submit content. It was a wake-up call that motivated me to sign up for Vocal.

I’m not going to re-submit that review I wrote. It’s not worth the risk. Medium is too important to me. My stats and earnings have been dramatically increasing lately, so I know I’m onto a good thing here.

Medium Rules

I Got Suspended From Medium For a Day — Why Did This Happen?

2 important lessons I learned from being banned for 24 hours

HALLELUJAH!

More from me…