HORSE STALL MAT ECONOMY

I Have Become A Friend of Medium!

May I buy your kinship during this season of sharing?

In the beginning — M had copious venture capital money and it was good. But writers ate of the tree of knowledge and learned how to do churn out cheap and easy follow-for-follow stories. It was not good. In fact, it was rotten, shitty garbage that degraded the platform. Instead of dealing with the shittiness, the Entity Bar was terminated by the powers that be. A patsy was needed, after all.

Then M, it in its infinite and undying wisdom, created a tiered system. The Eloi and the Morlocks. The Standard Membership and the free-tier of the Partner Program. It was kind of good. But it wasn’t enough — Coach Tony needed a new house, a log splitter axe, and some horse stall mats with which to lift heavy to the tunes of international muzak superstar Taylor Swift.

So Tony and the gang (Ariel and that alliterative fellow, I guess) invented the Friend Tier over afternoon margs. The initial idea of the Friend Tier was initially drafted after Tony became aware of a common children’s cereal called “Lucky Charms”. He noticed the heart was one of the marshmallow symbols on the box, in addition to the star (regular membership). The Friend Tier also made it more likely that an author is human because the risk of being banned for AI without notation came with fiscal consequence.

I personally cannot wait for the clover-tier at a whopping $150 per month and Blue Moons at $1500.

The Friend Tier represents the time traveler in H.G. Wells’ sci-fi epic— better than both castes, but placed out of time. The time traveler was guaranteed to be better than both Eloi and Morlock, just as the Friend Tier is better than anything that has come before. And by transitive property — I am now 4x more likeable than the next regular membership sap. This will bring me closer to other writers.

My participation in the Friend Tier isn’t just about pushing the needle closer to the ‘they will’ on the ‘will they or won’t they’ continuum as it pertains to Claire Franky. Sure, I’ll be clapping a bit harder for all of her stories. I just want to get some skin in the social writing game.

This benevolent act is about becoming more friendly with my writing peers using the only universal shared currency of friendship— transaction.

Put some respect on my name. I’ve paid handsomely to become your newest and most dashing best friend for the next 12-months.

As a Medium friend, I get to give my friends 4x the pennies I gave them before. I want to splash my friends a little and help them get wet. Is that so wrong?

I get a badge that makes me a Star-bellied Sneetch for the next 12 months. What could go wrong?

Now my friendliness is infinite.I finally rest and watch the sun rise on a grateful Mediumverse. I don’t need the tote bag, but I do need your love.

You see, by being a ‘friend’, I’ve socially obligated you all to like, nay love, me for at least a year. Some of you already do, and I don’t blame you. What sensation could be better than that?