Inspiration

If I Were the Owner of Medium, I Would Reprogram Alan the Algorithm

To distribute stories Chosen for Further Distribution, because it obviously doesn’t at the moment.

I might be wrong. Perhaps the algorithm excludes my chosen for further distribution stories from being distributed further. Maybe my stories deserve recognition but no follow-through to readers.

Please, don’t misunderstand me. The recognition from an algorithm is encouraging up to the point when I think about it too much. Then I realise I’m being patted on the head by artificial intelligence, Alan.

At the end of February, I transferred about eighteen stories from ILLUMINATION to ILLUMINATION-Curated because my work suddenly started gaining recognition from Alan, the algorithm. I didn’t bother with March because it was too tedious a chore. Plus, do you know how tricky it is to count all the titles without losing count?

Let’s take Childless Couple on Tenterhooks for Months.

The same story, different titles. First NB and then Medium.

As you can see, the honour of distribution did nothing much for the story. But you never know, thousands of eager readers tempted by my intriguing title and header image cropping up in their feed (or the bottom of someone else’s story or even at the bottom of another of my stories) could read it anytime.

I have to compare News Break with Medium. When my title is just the right side of clickbait, and News Break’s AI does an excellent job of distributing, I have made almost $1000 from people interested in reading my stories.

Published on Medium, the same story minus the clickbait title. This version is called Miles. No curation. Slightly better results with no help from Alan than the childless couple story.

How does Alan choose a story for distribution?

We know he likes:

• clever titles with little-used words in Title and subtitle format
• appropriate header images in landscape mode.
• colour not black and white.
• plenty of white space around carefully edited and formatted paragraphs and subheadings
• you can start off negative but should end on a positive note.
• good flow to entice readers to read the whole story.

Sometimes you might get lucky with a topical piece.

Aspiring to inspire Alan

So while I’m not inspiring many writers to appreciate being ‘chosen’ by Alan, I do sincerely aspire to inspire Medium and Alan to try a tad harder at the distribution part of their encouragement line.

Is it that much trouble for Alan to distribute for, let’s say, a week or a month? Two days doesn’t cut the mustard, does it?

Maybe no readers wanted to click on it. Does that speak to which readers are seeing it or to the choice Alan made in choosing it?

Does a chosen story even get distributed to one’s followers?

That would be an excellent start. Many writers lost their regular readers after the significant change on Medium last October. Alan stopped distributing top writer’s work for no apparent reason.

This monumental shift to sharing stories from writers I’ve never heard of, let alone follow, on my Medium app homepage means I don’t read many writers I don’t follow. As a writer, it’s wonderful being supported by my community of friends and fellow writers. But we are most writers who are busy writing. I adore reading what they write. But, what we writers really need is ravenous new readers.

By now Medium must have well over 100 million paying readers. According to this 2019 article by Casey Botticello the platform had almost 100 million then.

Medium and Alan, you’ve recognised us but neglected the follow-through. I call that all sizzle and no steak. It’s time to cherish your writers, more so the ones you choose to further distribute.

Do you know what would be the cherry on the top of this delicious frosted bun?

Alan distributing my chosen stories to readers who follow me, at the minimum.

Maybe some of my followers will unfollow because they don’t like my stories, especially if they’ve seen nothing I’ve written before. Maybe they’ll wait with great anticipation for the next. I think they’d like to see a special chosen story, wouldn’t you?

Then, after all my lovely followers have read my latest release or even simultaneously (because AI is clever like that), Alan could distribute to new readers. To see if we (Alan with his algorithm and me with my words) can tempt them.

Recognition from being chosen is nice. But being distributed in a meaningful, fruitful manner for writers, readers, and Medium would be better.

Much better.

Thank you, Dr Mehmet Yildiz, for providing a space for us to voice our writer’s pain and to help us gain more readers. I’d love your ILLUMINATION publications to lead the way.