Bringing Mae Flowers

I’m thinking about moving my writing over to Medium.

I’ve been writing on WordPress since 2017 and I’ve enjoyed growing my little community, but I feel like I’m not reaching the audience I was before. Part of this is due to the decline of blogging as an art form in general, but I can’t help but feel that the consolidation of the internet is also playing a part. Once upon a time it was easy to stumble across new, independent content organically. Now, people rely on algorithms to feed you what they think you should see. Instead of discovering content, we are presented with it- so if you aren’t where your audience is (or what the algorithm thinks you should be) you won’t be found.

The dead internet theory is partially true.

Lately I’ve been seeing more and more about the “dead internet theory“. If you don’t know, this theory explains how algorithms and AI are ruining the online experience. With little to no regulation in the industry, it’s almost impossible to know what’s real and what’s not. Is this video entertainment or an ad? Was this article written by a person or AI? Is this content I’m actually be interested in, or is the algorithm pushing an agenda? The internet has become a minefield of Deepfakes, plagiarism, and echo-chambers. Viewership is currency because data is gold. Even as someone who’s day job is marketing and data analysis, I find these trends alarming. It’s taken all the art and exploration out of the digital universe.

So what does this have to do with Medium?

I want to share my writing. I’ve had many hobbies over the years, but writing has been a consistent passion through them all. While the act of writing itself is rewarding, I still crave the recognition that comes with viewership and interaction. If I’m not being found by readers, I can’t get get the accolades I desire. Further more, if I do decide to try to turn writing into a career (a pipe-dream in our current media climate), I’ll need more consistent traffic. While I could do more to share my website and optimize it for SEO (the great irony of most marketers is how little we market ourselves), I still feel limited by my reach on this platform. I’m just not seeing the growth I did in the beginning.

So, what’s the plan?

For now my plan is to try both. I’ll continue updating and upgrading my content on WordPress while I experiment with Medium. Certain kinds of content perform better on different platforms, and finding the right niche and style for each takes time. It’s likely that I’ll end up keeping both long-term by posting different kinds of writing on each. What this content breakdown would look like, whether or not I repost between the two, and what posting schedule will be have yet to be determined. For now, you can find me here and there. You can follow me here on WordPress or on my Medium profile using the hyperlink. Either way, I hope to keep seeing you!