As I often note, as someone who almost exclusively writes poetry these days, I have zero expectations of making any money from Medium and I am good with that. My response to your article about Shannon Ashley is not as a writer, but as a reader. I come to Medium to read interesting articles, essays, stories, and poetry; I’m not here to read churned-out content. I agree Shannon is a talented writer and I sympathize with her story. That noted, and while I do wish her the best of continued success, at this point I’m only going to click on stories of hers that don’t feel like regurgitated variations of things I’ve already read. Those are becoming fewer and farther between.

And by being so open about what she’s been doing and how much she’s been making, I think it’s fair to say Shannon has spawned a whole gaggle of imitators who are striving to emulate her success. Without naming any names, the sum of it starts to feel like we are at content farm and clickbait levels of quality. I can’t be alone feeling like that. The bottom-line is quantity is not going to keep me engaged as a reader. For those of you trying to make real money from Medium, perhaps less is more: less articles produced per month, more time and attention spent per article.

These are my thoughts as a vested, dedicated reader. While I’m ultimately not going anywhere, it’s not hard to imagine what it feels like for more casual readers who are trying to decide whether or not to continue their Medium subscriptions.