My First Three Months on Medium

Written in bonus manufactured-stream-of-consciousness format.

(Note: this piece was written for a satirical publication called ‘MuddyUm’ aimed to relentless take the piss about Medium. The word ‘Medium’ was banned from articles.)

I want to get serious with my writing. This place looks good. By writers for writers etc. vibe about it. First glance looks fairly apolitical, maybe leaning a bit left. Sounds like me. Oh what, you can even make money from it! Sold.

Start reading more articles, mainly on religion, crossing with social issues. Wait, religion is a social issue. Some interesting articles from progressive religious believers on LGBTQ issues. That’s good to see.

Most of my recommended articles are now on LGBTQ issues. Ok, but not really what I’m here for. Start ‘Customizing my Interests’ (hello data analytics, of course you have infiltrated here as well). Same articles keep appearing. Start to think there might be a bit of an agenda being pushed here. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

One blog in particular keeps being suggested (still is) after politely but guiltily saying I would like to ‘see less (just joking, fewer) articles like this one’. Starting to be a bit annoying. Shit, they might think I’m homophobic? Some of my best fr… no that will just make it worse.

Sorry, that was a bad start. So, looks like this place is fairly left wing. That’s cool, I’m not here for politics anyway. But, for the record, I’ve been really left wing most of my life. Not just some of my friends, but my whole family are raving lefties. Pretty sure I still am left wing. Or at least progressive (are they the same still?). God help me if I’m now right wing.

Speaking of which, I should probably start by writing about my religion which pretty much no-one has heard of. I’m sure that will be popular. Oh, there is actually a publication for religion, including ones pretty much no-one has heard of! Massive props to Interfaith Now.

Write a few stories. Get a few claps. Realise belatedly that you can give more than one clap. Feel bad for the handful of articles I gave one clap to. Hope they didn’t think I was being passive aggressive in my applause?

First MuddyUm Partner Program payment comes in at an even $2.00. Realise there is a steep hill to climb here. Thoughts of ‘diversifying’ my writing arise, likely a subconscious reaction to all those tech startup and ‘10 Things’ articles, but also useful. Assume someone has written an article called ‘10 Things I Hate about MuddyUm’ with an unlicensed photo of Heath Ledger (RIP).

Unlicensed Photo of Heath Ledger (RIP) from 10 Things I Hate About You

Start writing ‘poetry’. How TF am I writing ‘poetry’? Realise I’ve actually been writing ‘poetry’ since I was an emo kid getting high and writing down my tortured feelings about girls, just didn’t realise it might actually classify as poetry until now. Start getting lots (relatively speaking) of claps. Feel immensely grateful to the MuddyUm poetry community.

Realisation: maybe I can earn money this way to balance out my articles on religion that roughly 3 people outside of my Facebook friends read! 2nd MuddyUm Partner Program payment come in at less than a coffee (have recently had to switch to decaf soy, which makes this cut extra deep). Lol @ Making Money on MuddyUm. Can I claim that as an article title if someone hasn’t used it already?

Concurrent to this: realisation starts to dawn that it is odd that MuddyUm features articles and publications on the top of the home page that I have no interest in. Realise that it wouldn’t be an overstatement to say that I have literally no interest in articles about tech startups. Or ‘10 Things’ articles (who am I kidding, of course I do).

Seems more difficult than it should be to find the articles that I’m likely to actually be interested in. Consider that this should be one of the most basic functions of a site that clearly uses relatively advanced and not at all creepy data analytics.

Find several excellent articles that confirm, indeed, how ridiculous MuddyUm’s homepage is, and that ‘it didn’t used to be like this’. Feel better, but also slightly sad that I may have missed out on the MuddyUm glory days while I was too busy going nowhere on Wordpress (WadPrize? WhatPriest?).

Go down a rabbit hole of MuddyUm diss-articles, many by people who seem to be very successful on MuddyUm. Ponder whether some inverted Stockholm Syndrome situation is at play here. Decide not to make a joke about abusive MuddyUm relationships, given I’m already on thin ice after my previous LGBTQ episode.

Find MuddyUm (as in, this publication). Takes me a good 5 minutes before I realise it is a play on Med… that word. Laugh, but also: Oh God, what have I gotten myself into here.

(Warning, satire ends here.)

Go back to the publications that most people haven’t heard of. Realise that there is every chance that these people are clapping and commenting with no ulterior motive in mind, just because they like what I have written.

Realise that, as cliched as it sounds, having only one person genuinely enjoy and be affected by your article is better than a free decaf Bonsoy cap.

Realise that I just started a Music publication within someone 24 hours after I had first communicated with them through a Facebook comment.

Realise that this is the outlet for my writing that I didn’t even realise I had been looking for. Get slightly emotional.

Realise that, ahhhh yes, that’s what I’ve got myself into here.