avatarJijo George

Summarize

Let’s Talk about Medium Suspensions

Steps Medium Should Take to Develop Trust

A Few Things That Need To Change

Photo by Alex Shute on Unsplash

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It has been about a week since the wave of suspensions hit a lot of unassuming writers.

There was a time when these suspensions were few and far between, usually restored within an hour of the email being sent.

This is no longer the case.

I was among the ones who got suspended but was restored within a couple of days of raising it with Medium. Ryan Canady was on the list too, and so was Viktoria Marty.

But some well-known writers are yet to get a response.

There has been a huge loss of trust among the Medium writers following these suspensions.

Below are some ways Medium can still recover the trust they have lost.

Update The Spam Filter

The current process seems to be detecting spam using some logic that does not make sense.

From what I heard a coordinated engagement is growth hacking. But how is it possible to determine what is coordinated effort and what is genuine interest?

Consider subscriptions. If I have 50 people I am subscribed to, 30 of them are subscribed back to me.

Will we not read each other content when posted? That is the whole point of subscribing.

Is this a growth hack?

Change The Way Spam Is Responded To

Based on the prior point there is no foolproof way to determine spam. Response to detecting growth hack should not be a suspension but an alert.

Allow the writer to present their case before suspending not after.

The suspension process impacts a profile as below

  1. Removes Stripe.
  2. Cancels MPP membership.
  3. Removes all stories from the paywall.
  4. Makes the profile unavailable.
  5. Users can no longer read paywalled stories
  6. It is still not clear what happens to the remaining subscription

If I have paid for membership then I should be allowed to continue reading stories and comment on them since the subscription is paid for.

Also in case I would have not been unsuspended what would have happened to my remaining subscription which was over 6 months in my case?

Handle Suspended Account Better On Resuming

The support on unsuspension is almost nonexistent.

Even when unsuspended due to Medium’s error above state remains as is with the writer being responsible for reinstating the above things.

For someone who has been on the platform for years, this is too much to do on every story they have.

In my case resuming membership caused me to be double charged for my yearly membership. It is still in dispute, although I expect a positive outcome.

Be Specific About Rules

Even on being unsuspended, I was never told why I was suspended. This does not make sense.

The only reason Medium provided for suspensions was growth hacking/fraud, but never clarified what growth hacking truly means.

In the absence of this information, how is a writer supposed to know what is, or what is not allowed?

Even the Terms and Services are not clear. Neither are the rules

Terms like disproportionate are very vague, is it 10 or 100?

If clap and runs, spamming with stories using AI, etc are truly the reasons how come some accounts participating in such behavior are still on medium?

An example below, hiding names since I only suspect them to be growth hacking.

It is for Medium to decide. This person pushes about 4 stories a day.

Some actively ask for people to engage promising a boost.

And the presence of read-for-read on Social Media is not hidden from anyone.

Respond Promptly

Responses to the justification from Medium have been very sub-par.

Most writers are given the same reason but no clarity, and there is no specific SLA.

Many of the writers I know have been waiting for over a week with no response.

These writers are genuine writers I know, some of them have been boosted multiple times (Ammara Hassan), some have been Top writers in their niche in the past three years(Israr Khan), and some are research scientists(Amir Bibi). Others have been very regular writers with very good content(Saeed Sobhani, Huzaifa Irfan). These are just the names on top of my head.

Except for Saeed and Huzaifa, I have only come across the rest a few times on Medium, but after suspension, I connected with them, and their frustration is very understandable. I do remember their stories which itself is a testament to their content.

The least Medium can do is respond promptly to their requests.

Be Mindful Of What Is Said In Public

The response of Medium management on Social Media and Medium has been very strange.

Tony Stubblebine responses were very dismissive, reminding me of the response of Coles & Woolworth's CEO in Australia during the recent Colesworth scandal.

Buster Benson responses have been more mature and hopeful.

I understand different people handle crises differently, but not sure if Medium has a PR team that works on this to ensure trust.

But this is something that needs introspection.

What we have on Medium is a community, of which these two are a big part.

I am all for getting rid of Bots, and growth hackers. But being considerate of genuine writers is very important.

Much like real life everyone should be presumed innocent until proven guilty.

The responses from top management should be ones of hope not dismissiveness.

I have many writer friends saying this is all just a fraud, Medium is a Ponzi scheme about to crumble. I do not agree with any of that. But there should be an official post on the topic with deadlines so writers have their hope restored.

What Next?

As I write this there are a lot of great writers I know who are yet to get a response.

I am sure you might know some too.

Please add the names of your favorite writers who are missing from the platform in the response section.

Maybe we can help them in some way.

Some who do not know anyone like this might be thinking what is the big deal, they can move on to another platform.

They should remember

A writer does not write only for money, but for respect. Being called a fraud is the most disrespectful thing you can do to a writer. Lets fight for their respect.

You can share this with your loved ones if this is worthy of being shared.

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