Why I Left Medium And Moved To Vocal

Five months ago, I started writing on Medium. I had the idea to share thoughts and experiences, and I was even more excited to know that Medium was willing to reward the effort with its Partnership program.

During that time, I wrote about 30 articles (in English and Spanish), which barely made me $5. Seriously, I got $5 for 30 articles... That's even less than what a freelance writer from Pakistan or Bangladesh makes on Fiverr.

I know the idea of ​​membership is not exactly that you make more money as a writer just for being a member (the vast majority of writers on Medium make $100 or less a month, but it's more common to make less).

Anyway, I expected to get better results in 5 months than I actually got as a paying member, especially when I compare Medium's system with other monetization options for bloggers like AdSense.

Ok, Medium does not show you ads and AdSense ARE ads, but I think they should improve their monetization system because the content on Medium is of great quality and clearly someone is taking more than half the pie.

What kind of content did I post on Medium?

From personal stories about being an entrepreneur, to letters to my deceased father, poems and short essays on spirituality.

I took the advice of the "gurus" and looked for publications with a wide scope, but I don't think I have achieved better results than I would have obtained writing for smaller publications.

I have no complaints about the publications, after all they are managed by Medium members (members who pay $5 a month, so they basically pay to make Medium's life easier).

In fact, I have seen publishers very committed to disseminating content on networks outside of Medium, and frankly I think they do more than Medium does to promote you as an author.

Actually, Medium does pretty well promoting THEIR PUBLICATIONS on Twitter, but only occasionally they share the articles of authors who are not editors or writers in those publications. Elemental, for example, IS a Medium publication.

Medium seems like the new Facebook for me... And that's awful

One would hope that a company like Medium would have something better to offer than curating your article if they consider it complies with the editorial guide.

Their editorial guide is not difficult to follow, the difficult thing is that one of the Medium editors find your article using an algorithm that does not even seem to work in your favor when you have few followers.

I would like to have another opinion, but I don't see how Medium is different from any social network. Instead of "Likes" there are Claps, and by the way, I think it is a terrible idea to make people see how many claps you have.

It is a form of informational bias (same as in all social networks) and it makes the essential purpose of a writing / reading platform a bit lost.

I mean, do the folks at Medium know how many brilliant writers came out of dusty towns without the world having a clue who they were? Gabriel Garcia Marquez was one of them, and if he had depended on "likes" or "claps" he might not have become anyone.

How am I doing at Vocal?

I have been writing in Vocal for a week and have made $0.24 cents with 50 readings.

I read an article the other day and someone said you can make more money on Medium than on Vocal (plus Medium membership is cheaper), but here's the truth: if you want to be more likely to generate passive income with your articles, use VOCAL.

• First, Medium is not going to pay you for reads / views from non-members. Vocal will pay you.
• Second, Medium has a reading limit of 3 articles per month for non-members. Vocal doesn't have it, and considering you're going to get paid no matter who reads your article (as long as it's a human), that's GREAT.
• Third, in Vocal the number of hearts that an article receives is not yet public, and that prevents readers from being dissuaded or considering that your article is terrible just because it has few "likes". This is just what happens on freelancing platforms like Fiverr, people believe that seeing a lot of stars means that you found the right person to do the job, but in reality the stars only tell you that this person has been very active in the last months / years. It does not mean that someone with a lower average grade is not trained to do a better job.
• Lastly, Vocal is organized into communities and has its editors. I rely more on a centralized system where the company does its job assigning writers rather than putting members to work. Also, at Vocal, you don't have to put up with pretentious editorial guides that humiliate you just because you want to create something other than the typical "How To Make $3,000 a Month On Medium"

Please, there has to be something more momentous in life.

The truth is that I don't have high expectations, I've been a freelance writer for 5 years and earn $2,000 a month working 25 hours a week, not counting my passive income.

The idea of making a lot of money from a single article (like the gurus on Medium) is surely tempting for everyone, but who knows what effect it would have on me. Would I start writing about anything? Would I try to fit in like the people on Facebook and Instagram?

I don't want to become that kind of person (although I've been very close sometimes). I want to die having the courage to really speak my mind about someone or something (without ruining their dignity). So, this is what I think of Medium:

Do it for love, but don't expect too much of them because they aren't doing too much. You would be better off with a blog and AdSense if you want to make a living on writing.