This Awful Medium Tip Was the Biggest Turnoff Ever

Are we here to read and write, or to play games?

About a year ago I discovered Instagram. (Yes, I’m a slow adapter).

I thought I’ve found heaven. I love photography, but found most websites where you can share your photos inadequate, each for its own array of reasons. And here’s a huge, vibrant community of like-minded people, who quickly enough find your photos and comment on them.

But then: Buy 1,000 followers for only $8.99! Write your photo’s description in the first comment! (Anything else will result in failure). Upload new photos on weekends, preferably at noon! Absolutely use the maximum number of tags allowed, even if your photo could actually do just fine with five.

I was baffled. This was supposed to be a place where artists share their creations?

Of course, I naively ignored the social-media aspect of the whole thing. But even then: while I’ve nothing against social media, Instagram increasingly started to seem to me devoid of merit. A game for influencers and gurus. I lost interest.

(And for the life of me, I’ll never understand the thingie with Instagram stars that simply upload photos of themselves and get thousands of hearts. Sure, I love seeing photos of the Grand Canyon, and I generally like Brandon McTravel the globetrotting adventurer, but why do I need to see a photo of him posing in front of the Grand Canyon?)

Now I’m on Medium, and I’m having a déjà vu. At first glance: a huge, vibrant community of like-minded people, who quickly enough find your stories and comment on them! What could possibly be wrong?

Nothing! Aside from curation jail. Curgatory. Write Your Titles in Title Case or Get Rejected. Submit to major publications only after you’ve written at least a dozen stories (I bet that’s why JK Rowling was rejected so many times). Use only curatable tags from Botticello’s list. Pay more attention to reading time than to claps, now that the payment algorithm changed — again. Publish only on weekdays, preferably at midnight.

And the tip to top them all: go to an article in your favorite topic that has many fans, open the list of clappers, and click Follow on all of them. Big chance that many will follow back. An easy shortcut to expand your network. The speed of your finger is the only bottleneck.

Does it really work? To a degree, I guess. But I’m finding that I’m forced to dedicate more and more of my time to this kind of trickery instead of to reading and writing. I’m not protesting against the purveyor of this tip, mind you (can’t even remember who that was). He was addressing a need — no problem with that.

But do I want to invest my time in a platform where this appears to be the major need?

If someone followed me, how do I know if she actually likes my writing or just hoping that I follow back?

(I’m looking at you, Roz).

The write-a-story-with-the-last-word-being-Roz challenge: check.