I Will Not Read Your Post If It’s Going To Take Ten Minutes

Who Has That Kind of Time?

When it comes to making money on Medium, claps are kaput.

The only relevant Metric, according to our Medium Overlords?

Read Time!

The longer time readers spend savoring your Medium Masterpiece the more you’ll get paid.

Writer Roy has quipped that this makes him a very valuable follower because he is an extremely slow reader.

I am not a slow reader. I skim. I skip. I scroll.

I will blast right through your piece, highlighting and Commenting as I go — and then it’s on to the next post!

Sure, I’m a generous Clapper, but who cares about that?

According to the Almighty Algorithm? Longer work is better. Because longer posts mean longer Read Time, which means More Money.

So? Medium Writers who want to make money on this platform are thinking about Going Long.

Fuck Haiku! It’s time to write a 12 million line epic poem!

I’m done posting short clever humor pieces. From now on, I’m writing nothing but existential 20-minute riffs about chain saws and porch lights!

I am hereby putting all of you on notice:

If it’s going to take me ten minutes? I’m probably not going to read your post.

Why?

I have no patience.

I have no attention span.

And at 64? I haven’t got as much time as I used to.

(It’s a lucky thing that I read The Lord of the Kings when I was a teenager because there’s no way I’d tackle that trilogy now.)

My sweet spot? Three minutes. (I’ll check out anything that takes about the same time to read as it takes to brush my teeth.)

So if you write 15 minute epics?

Don’t expect me to turn up.

But if you can amuse or enlighten me (or both!) in under five minutes?

I’ll follow you forever.

And? I promise to do my best to emulate Roy and read your posts v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y.

Writing Coach and editor-for-hire Roz Warren, who writes for everyone from the Funny Times to the New York Times, can help you improve and publish your work. Drop her a line at [email protected]. (That’s Ros with an “s,” not a “z.”)