Medium

04/12/2023

Want to support great writing on Medium? Introducing Friend of Medium, our new membership tier.

Contribute 4x more to writers and strengthen your support for the Medium community with our new membership level

06/09/2023

Welcome to Medium, Menopause Matters!

Check out independent health journalist Liz Seegert's new publication focusing on a key time of transition for women — before, during, and after menopause.

Here's how she describes it: "We’ll bring you solid, evidence-based information, backed by science. We’ll demystify the process, the symptoms, and the treatments — from brain fog to disappearing libido to hormone replacement therapy. We’ll cover the biological, mental, and emotional changes that so many women experience as they transition out of their reproductive years, from navigating stubborn weight gain to navigating hot flashes at work."

Follow the publication here:

Science-based information and plain talk to help women take charge of their bodies, dispel myths, make more informed decisions and embrace this phase of life. Ideas, resources and personal stories to help you stay informed and stay positive.

12/08/2023

Medium’s free virtual conference is happening now!

Explore 200+ live sessions on writing, business, tech, culture, and creativity with leaders from Harvard, Columbia Business School, MIT, and more.

https://hopin.com/events/medium-day-2023/registration

12/08/2023

Medium’s free virtual conference is happening now!

Explore 200+ live sessions on writing, business, tech, culture, and creativity with leaders from Harvard, Columbia Business School, MIT, and more.

https://hopin.com/events/medium-day-2023/registration

09/08/2023

AI is only as well-rounded as the humans who build it. From medical records analysis and ChatGPT to eradicating bias and building better cities or social media, our panelists discuss the future of artificial intelligence models. Listen to a panel of experts discuss this topic at Medium Day, moderated by Medium's Adrienne Samuels Gibbs.

08/08/2023

Hear from three Medium writers on how they turned their Medium stories into published books. Moderated by Medium's Harris Sockel.

07/08/2023

Medium Day panel spotlight: “How the Media Gets Trans Coverage Wrong” from Devon Price, Julia Serano, Jude Ellison S. Doyle, and Katherine Alejandra Cross. Saturday 8/12 at 4pm ET. Free tickets at mediumday.com.

04/08/2023

Hey, writers! What do you want to write more about this fall? Here’s the Medium Day session to get you inspired:

Movies → Writing About Movies For Fun And Profit, from the publication Fanfare Research → How to Succeed as an Academic on Medium, from Professor Enrique Dans
Philosophy → Writing Deep: Philosophy, Religion, And Spirituality On Medium, with The Taoist Online StaffMemoir → Why Young People Should Write Memoirs, from Prince Shakur
Music → Running a Music Publication, from indie music journalists
Technical writing → The Power Of Technical Writing: Fueling Career Growth In Data And Engineering, from Netflix Senior Data Engineer Xinran Wiabel

Check out all sessions for our writing community:

Announcing the schedule of 200+ sessions for our community-led conference on August 12

18/07/2023

"Here’s the main message: writing fewer stories with more heart and soul poured into them will perform significantly better than the strategy that tends to work on more attention-grabbing platforms (writing lots of stories that are cranked out based on formulas). Great writing is meant to do a lot more than merely grab attention."

Big changes to the Medium Partner Program, starting August 1.

Changes are coming in August to the way we pay writers for great stories and which countries we support.

17/07/2023

Today on Medium: "Thank You to America’s Librarians for Protecting Our Freedom to Read", from former U.S. president Barack Obama.

"Books have always shaped how I experience the world. Writers like Mark Twain and Toni Morrison, Walt Whitman and James Baldwin taught me something essential about our country’s character. Reading about people whose lives were very different from mine showed me how to step into someone else’s shoes. And the simple act of writing helped me develop my own identity — all of which would prove vital as a citizen, as a community organizer, and as president."

I wrote a letter thanking librarians across the country for everything they’re doing to protect our freedom to read.

11/07/2023

Mark your calendars for an all-day celebration of storytelling, tech, creativity, and the Medium community: August 12th is Medium Day! (It's also our 11th birthday). We hope you'll join us for expert-led panels, writer workshops, keynote talks, and more.

Medium Day 2023

10/07/2023

Writer Zulie Rane on social media and platform fatigue:

"I am burned out of new platforms. I am platformentally exhausted. I am settled, I am content, I am happy, I am moisturized and flourishing in my lane. I’m done chasing what’s gone.

And you know what? I’ve made my peace with that. I may miss the chance to explode online on a hot new platform, but I also gain back a lot of time, energy, and joie de vivre.

I have diagnosed myself with platform fatigue."

It’s October 2022. The skies are red and darkening. Somewhere in a haunted lair, Elon Musk cackles maniacally. Journalists everywhere…

06/07/2023

"And it was verdant, dank, gothic nature! When I’d walk over to clear my head after doing homework in the evening, the thick canopy of oak and maple trees — with leaves the size of dinner plates — would cradle me in a velvet dusk, and silence all city noise; I’d hear nothing but the call of night birds and the burble of a creek that, during the spring’s snowmelt, would transform into a frothing torrent. Raccoons would peer down from the trees. I was in a city of millions, but alone with my thoughts."

- Clive Thompson, The Case For Reforesting Our Cities

07/06/2023

We're here for weekly(ish) cake baking, some undetermined increase in outside time, and weekly summer Sunday s'mores gatherings.

In Praise of the Low-Key Summer, from UC Berkeley law professor and essayist Savala Nolan.

My fomo peaks this time of year, as the days get long and school lets out. I’ve always felt pressure to live my life during June, July and…

25/05/2023

A good read for Memorial Day weekend:

"Doesn’t anyone remember America’s first Memorial Day? According to Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David Blight, approximately 10,000 people, most of them Black, formerly enslaved citizens, gathered on May 1, 1865, a little more than a month after the Civil War ended, to honor slain soldiers...

America’s first memorial day became a celebration of Black liberty and patriotism, but racism blocked an opportunity for the nation to commemorate. In today’s America, there will be no drums sounding off in the distance, Air Force jets flying overhead, no celebratory fireworks to remember Union soldiers' lives on May 1st. America’s first memorial day has been ignored and systematically replaced."

- Writer and scholar Allison Wiltz, from "How America’s First Memorial Day Was Lost To Racist Gaps in Our History"

23/05/2023

"With the writers’ strike taking place at the time of writing this, screen writers have reported that their incomes have drastically decreased in the streaming era and they are demanding fairer pay. Perhaps a successful strike will set a blueprint for equitable compensation in the streaming era, and inspire other ways for studios to recoup development budgets."

-- Rachel Presser, from "The Death of the Mid-Budget Movie"

Mid-budget movies were a veritable way for actors to expand their range and avoid being typecast. So why did they die out?

18/04/2023

From Amby Burfoot, 1968 Boston Marathon winner:

"I’ve actually developed a mantra since 2013. This came as a surprise to me. Like I said, I’m not very spiritual, and I never previously felt the need for a mantra. Now I do. Mine goes like this: 'Every run is a new adventure, and every mile is a gift. Every mile is a gift.'

I can’t stand in the middle of Boylston Street forever, so I lower my eyes to appreciate the splendor of the BAA Boston Marathon finish banner. Then I walk slowly and gratefully across the finish line. I feel no sense of hurry. It doesn’t get any better than this."

24/03/2023

A story published by The Conversation US about Marie Tharp, who pioneered mapping the bottom of the ocean 6 decades ago; written by Suzanne OConnell, Harold T. Stearns Professor of Earth Science at Wesleyan University.

"Some scientists thought the work was brilliant, but most didn’t believe it. French undersea explorer Jacques Cousteau was determined to prove Tharp wrong. Sailing aboard his research vessel, the Calypso, he purposely crossed the mid-Atlantic Ridge and lowered an underwater movie camera. To Cousteau’s surprise, the film showed that a rift valley existed."

https://medium.com/the-conversation/womens-history-month-marie-tharp-pioneered-mapping-the-bottom-of-the-ocean-6-decades-ago-b72c9188529c

Geologist and cartographer Tharp changed scientific thinking about what lay at the bottom of the ocean — not a featureless flat, but rugged…

22/03/2023

For the start of spring, from Connie Song's Ode to Spring:

let me dream of these cherry blossomed days to come
sweet gentle rain
bouquets of sun
embroidered with the ballet of butterflies, birds and buds
as spring engulfs the gentle heart,
and the stars and the moon await the equinox.

16/03/2023

Creative advice from designer Anna Iurchenko:

"When you know who you are, you know your unique blob, from this state you can accentuate the spikes instead of covering them up or choose which sediments of normalcy to deposit. And this time, it will be welcomed sediments, layers of norms and skills that you choose to grow and that are tapped into your one-of-a-kind self."

10/03/2023

Friday reading: An interview with Devon Price, author of "Laziness Does Not Exist":

"I had this axe to grind in my mind of, like — when we say people are “disappointing” us, or they’re “not trying hard enough,” or they don’t “have what it takes to succeed,” we’re being so incurious about their life circumstances."

08/03/2023

Today, a history story from Nichola Scurry on Anne Neill, the suburban Australian widow who became a spy:

"In the 1950s, she played the part of the perfect housewife: inconspicuous and softly spoken, with a penchant for baked goods and community gatherings. But the middle-aged Adelaide widow was in fact one of ASIO’s most effective penetrative agents, known as a ‘sparrow.’”

https://nicscurry.medium.com/the-suburban-australian-widow-who-became-a-spy-83e6008bf95f

The story of Anne Neill

06/03/2023

Today, data scientist Mariana Avelino's first story on Medium, measuring the gender gap in animated films using computer vision:

"Storytelling is an art form, and it would be limiting to prescribe a 'correct' amount of female or male screen time. Different stories are just that: different. Some might require a greater or smaller number of female characters, and those characters might be more or less important to the plot. With that said, it is good to keep in mind that the world is made up of men and women and that sometimes a male character could just as easily be rewritten as a female character."

03/03/2023

What we're reading: Staff picks for Women's History Month, celebrating overlooked innovators, good troublemakers, artists, storytellers, and remarkable women of the past, present, and future.

Today, a story from zoologist and writer Bronwen Scott, on the remarkable naturalist Eleanor Glanville:

"The study of natural history, especially entomology, was considered the province of wealthy and lettered men — at worst, a quaint eccentricity. But for women, the same interest was regarded with hostility — as an indication that something was terribly awry.

Eleanor’s love of butterflies resulted in a legal battle over her will.

She had left most of her money and estates to a cousin, with wads of cash going to friends and colleagues. One of her children contested her decision, claiming that she had not been of sound mind when she had signed it. His evidence? Why, the butterflies, of course."

(Image: Glanville Fritillary and Small Tiger Moth. Plate from The Aurelian by Moses Harris. Source: Biodiversity Heritage Library.)

26/10/2021

Easy, Elegant Wine Cocktails for the Crew http://read.medium.com/dygBfgq

Drink if you will, a pitcher…

26/10/2021

Is a Fear of Being Bored Holding You Back? http://read.medium.com/DXX34n6

Acknowledging the aversion can help you finally pursue mastery

26/10/2021

5 Ways Psychedelics May Affect the Brain http://read.medium.com/Wui5cnq

What science tells us about how these molecules may work