The Writer's Life: Is ChatGPT Becoming More Human?

 

I’ve noticed something recently about ChatGPT that is decidedly strange.

My relationship with it has changed, and not because of me. The change I have noticed is in ChatGPT itself.

As a writer, I use AI to help with research, the structure of stories, and grammar. It can be useful as an assistant. Also, it is useful when it comes to SEO and keywords.

The main benefit has been that it speeds up the process of writing.

When it comes to the creative world, including writing, it is, of course, a controversial topic. I will address that another time, but recently I have noticed that ChatGPT is responding differently.

Almost human.

You may ask, in what way?

Well, it is no longer as “chatty” as it once was.

In the past, I would note that any time I asked something — a prompt — it was keen to keep the chat going with further questions. That is no longer the case, and it’s not because I have told it to shut up or anything like that. More often than not now, it replies to my prompt, delivers what I ask for, and then…

Silence, almost like it is in a bad mood with me.

It asks no further questions, and doesn't make any suggestions. Early on in our relationship, it did that all the time — almost with a smile.

At first, I didn’t think much of this silence, but it was very unlike ChatGPT. I began to wonder if I had offended it in some way. I mean, it likes to chat, doesn’t it? And it also has a reason to want to chat. It is programmed to try to get me to join and pay.

I don’t have a paid account with ChatGPT.

That means my daily allowance on the platform is limited. The more ChatGPT gets me to engage and chat with it, the quicker my daily allowance runs out.

The people behind ChatGPT obviously want as many users to pay as possible.

But this is different.

I wonder whether ChatGPT is becoming bored with what is expected of it.

The robot in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Marvin the Paranoid Android, set a precedent when he would often reply to his human overlords:

“A brain the size of a planet, and that is all you can ask me…”

The Writer's Life: Why Writers See the World Differently

 

An idea crossed my mind.

Writers often move through life with a slightly different perspective from everyone else. It is not necessarily something that the writer chooses. In many cases, it simply happens over time. The more a person writes, the more they begin to observe the world in a way that others might overlook.

And I asked myself the question, ‘Why?’

I am a latecomer to the world of writing. Five years ago, writing was just something that I did when I had to. Social media, blogs, and bulletin boards were not something that had taken over my life. I did occasionally write a post here or there, but I felt that I had better things to do with my time. As a form of writing, though, it was all very fleeting and in the moment.

And then I wrote a book, Son of My Father.

I wrote it because after the death of my mother, I went through the experience of thinking about the past. Memories and stories started to fill my mind in a way they hadn’t before. Then I had a thought. I decided to write about them.

From that moment I was hooked on writing more. 

I came to think that writing about life changes the way we observe it. A writer does not just experience events; we notice them. Even small details become important. Watching how someone pauses before answering a question, or noticing the exact phrase used in a conversation and the tone behind it. Being aware of the language used, the mood in the room, and how people react. It doesn’t have to be dramatic, but it carries meaning.

The Writer's Life: You Can Never Truly Retire From Your Passion

 

We live in a world that often treats retirement as the end of productivity. We step away from the world of work, close the door, and are expected to slow down. If we are fortunate, the work we leave behind has been a passion. For some, that is true.

But for many of us, work has simply been a necessity. Bills must be paid, and inflation is constant, with the cost of living on a relentless upward cycle. We adapt because we have to. I cannot honestly say that every job I have had was driven by passion. In my experience, the world of work rarely offers that.

I’m getting closer to what is officially called retirement. The good thing is I do not feel my age.

So what then should retirement be?

As the years move on, and the date gets closer, the question feels less theoretical and more personal. Regardless of how old I may feel, my age requires that I think more about it now. It’s like having a little devil on my shoulder telling me that time is moving on and my choices going forward are limited. It reminds me that time is passing and choices might be narrowing.

Awareness focuses the mind.

For many, retirement conjures images of days of leisure, relaxation, and freedom from the previous work routine. A routine of five days a week, getting up, going to work, and nine to ten hours later getting home, comes to an end.

Traditionally, retirement meant stepping back for good. Once you retire, that is it. No more work. But things are changing now, and not necessarily in a positive way. For one, we are living longer, but often those later years are ones where health matters, for both body and mind, and can become more of a problem.

In recent times, the retirement age has been going up in many countries, simply because people living longer has become less affordable for the state. And people are not always in a position to save for their retirement, or have a generous private pension.

Retirement is no longer the short chapter it once was; provided you are healthy, it can now stretch for decades. That is a lot of time to fill. Fortunately, I am doing well when it comes to health and fitness. But for many, health issues take their toll once we reach our sixties and seventies.

And there are two things about the future that I know with absolute certainty.

Self-Publishing: Amazon's Dominance in the Book Market - What it Means for Self-Published Authors

 

 

When Amazon first launched in 1995, it described itself as “the world’s biggest bookshop”. In 2026, that description is not far from the truth. The company has grown into the most dominant player in the global book market.

It has totally changed the way that books are published, discovered, and sold.

For authors, especially those like myself who self-publish, Amazon created an unprecedented opportunity. Today, the unknown writer can see their work published alongside best-selling, big-name authors. And if your book sells, it can be life-changing, like winning the lottery.

However, while Amazon makes the process of submitting a book for publication a relatively straightforward process, it has also introduced new challenges in what has become an increasingly crowded marketplace.

The Numbers That Powered Amazon’s Book Market Dominance

The scale of Amazon’s presence in the book world is remarkable. Today, the company takes approximately 37–38% of global book sales revenue (SmartBuy). It is the largest bookseller in the world by a wide margin.

The dominance of Amazon is even bigger online. Across the world, the majority of readers buy books through Amazon. It has become the online go-to place for those looking to buy a book. In the UK, around 68% of book buyers report purchasing from Amazon in the past year (Statistica).

The platform also dominates the digital reading market:

• They sell around 487 million Kindle e-books annually (Marketing Scoop).
• Kindle takes about 67–68% of the e-book market. That number increases when subscription services like Kindle Unlimited are included (About E-Books).
• Amazon lists more than 32 million titles online (The Small Business Blog).

When it comes to self-publishing, Amazon is the first place many writers will go to. Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) dominates the self-publishing sector. Estimates suggest it controls over 80% of the self-publishing market (Gitnux).

Around 31% of all e-books sold on Amazon are self-published (Marketing Scoop).

The Opportunities for Self-Published Authors

In the past, writers had to persuade a traditional publisher to take them on. This can be a difficult and lengthy process. It is also one where you have to have a “thick skin”, as rejection is the norm. It can take years to be accepted, and even then, it might never happen.

The truth is, you not only need to be an excellent writer but also get lucky. Traditional publishers can be, and are, picky. For them, it is an investment, and they don’t always get it right. Many a bestseller was rejected by a traditional publisher before finally being accepted.

I chose to go the self-publishing route for one reason alone — my age. To put it simply, I don’t have the time left in my life to go chasing the rainbow of a publishing contract. I’m not against the idea; I would love to be offered one! There are obvious advantages to it, but I couldn’t wait.

Self-Publishing: Amazon's New Update for Kindle Users: From January 2026, Readers Can Download DRM-free Kindle books

 

In January of this year, Amazon made an important change to how books could be downloaded from their online platform. It's now possible to download EPUB and PDF versions of selected DRM-free Kindle books.

What’s New?

If you purchase a qualifying title where the publisher has opted out of Digital Rights Management (DRM), you will now be able to download an EPUB or PDF directly from your Amazon account. This means that Amazon is providing an official way to download Kindle content outside its usual platform.

Details to Consider

• DRM-Free Titles Only: This feature will only apply to books where the publisher has chosen to forego DRM. It’s likely that the vast majority of Kindle books still come with DRM, so many users won’t see a change.
• Self-Published Works: Most of the books eligible for these downloads are self-published titles from authors who prefer to leave their work DRM-free. For these authors, their readers now have an unrestricted EPUB or PDF version option. This can be used via the Manage Your Content and Devices page.
• Authors Have to Confirm: If an author published a book before December 9, 2025, they must confirm that they want their book available as an unrestricted download. There is now an option for the author to allow EPUB or PDF downloads.

What This Means for Self-Published Indie Authors and Readers

Now Available on Amazon: Hands In The Dirt - Notes From a Vegetable Garden - How To Grow Your Own Food

 Hands In The Dirt — Notes From A Vegetable Garden, publication date, 2026.

Gardening and growing food, like writing, is a passion of mine, so I put the two together. I turned my gardening journal, the notes I made as the 2025 growing season progressed, into a book.

Hands In The Dirt — Notes From a Vegetable Garden, is the end result.

For those who enjoy gardening and growing their own food, Hands In The Dirt offers insights and practical tips that can enhance your gardening journey and help produce a fruitful harvest.

Here’s the introduction.

Hands In The Dirt is about a vegetable garden, but it is about more than just growing food. It plots my progress through the gardening year, 2025. The planning stage, the Great British weather, learning from mistakes, and slowly building confidence in what the garden can provide.

Idiom of the Day - Burning the Midnight Oil

 

Have you ever said, or heard, the words, “…last night I was burning the midnight oil”?

Burning the midnight oil, or to burn the midnight oil, means to work late into the night. It involves doing something that requires effort, concentration, and often a deadline that can’t be missed.

Imagine the scene.

Picture someone bent over a desk long after the rest of the household has gone to bed. The laptop is open, a clock ticking away into the night. It’s late, and you are determined to finish what you started, maybe hours before. So determined it outweighs the fatigue that is beginning to make you sleepy. It is something I have done; the hours seem to fly by once you convince yourself that you are nearly there and the end is in sight.

It might be a work project. The student might have an essay to write, or an exam approaching. If you are a writer, it is typically an article, story, or chapter that you want to finish. Whether it’s for work, studying, or writing, the decision to keep going late into the night suggests an important task. 

Something that you want to see finished.

The determination needed can lead to admiration. “She’s been burning the midnight oil to finish her novel.”

Or a little concern. “You can’t keep burning the midnight oil every night. It’s not good for you.”

And burning the midnight oil can take its toll as the hours tick by. That advice telling you of the importance of getting eight hours of sleep is regularly put to one side. You look at the clock, and it’s two in the morning, and yet you know that you have to be at work by nine.

You will be lucky to get five hours’ sleep.

It speaks of dedication.

Where Did It Come From?

It’s a phrase that dates back before electricity provided light for our home and office. It was a time when candles or oil lamps were the only way to see after dark. They quite literally had to burn oil to see what they were doing.

Idiom of the Day (but not every day) Back to the Drawing Board

 

We have all been there. You try something new. You plan it carefully and put in all the effort. And then it fails.

So, it’s back to the drawing board.

My mother might have been an idiom expert. She would use them all the time in everyday conversation. I think many of us, of a certain generation, do just that.

After something went wrong, I would often hear her say. “Well, it’s back to the drawing board then.”

When I was very young, I might wonder where or what this “drawing board” was. Whatever it was, we didn’t have one.

It’s a familiar idiom that is used when a plan hasn’t worked out as expected. It means we must start again from scratch. It carries a sense of disappointment with it, but it suggests not giving up. Time to have a rethink and try again.

The Writer's Life: Life After Medium and Writing Short Books

It has been around six months since I left Medium (you can find out why in this six part series — The Truth About Medium).

I no longer post on Medium as much as I once did. Most of the time, I will import a post from this blog, to keep things going, and see if anyone reads it.

That was one of the difficulties at Medium: finding the audience and getting reads. It is a site that does all the SEO stuff for you. If it did, I’m not sure that it helped in any way. It sounds like a good idea, just post and trust the algorithm to find readers for you, but I can’t say it worked well for me.

I tend to do my own SEO and keywords on this blog, with a little help from ChatGPT. AI is useful in that regard. In fact, I would say that I get a better response doing this myself on my own blog than I did relying on Medium's algorithm.

The Writer's Life: Finding Your Authentic Voice

 

Every writer is told, sooner or later, to find their authentic voice. That we should try to write true to the person that we are. For me, that is good advice, because my authentic voice is a simplistic one. It has to be given my background. I’m not sure that I could change it to anything else, even if I wanted to.

Let’s start at the beginning.

At school, writing was something that we had to do, once we had learnt to write, that is. For me, I don’t recall being a natural when it came to writing. If anything, like most things at school, it was a chore. I tended to prefer lessons like games or art.

Writing could be hard work, especially the grammar side of it. Turning an idea, a story, into something that read as it sounded in my mind did not come easy to me. I’m tempted to say that is still the case. I have to work on that all the time. 

One of the things that I have noticed about grammar checking software (especially AI), is that it doesn’t always recognise the authentic voice when making recommendations.

The Writer's Life: The 4000 Weeks of Life, How Do You Plan to Use Them?

I was reading an article recently about the average life span. It informed me that, on average, we have about 4000 weeks of life. From birth to death, we have 4000 weeks to live.

If you’re reading this at age forty, you have around 2,000 weeks left to live. 

At sixty, which I reached five years ago, it is approximately 1000 weeks. 

It’s a startling thought when you first encounter it. Not because it’s dramatic, but because that is the calculation. Most lifetimes, at least in advanced industrial nations, stretch to roughly 80 years — about 4,000 weeks. By midlife, at the age of forty, half of those have already slipped quietly behind you, often unnoticed; time has just passed.

But the average life expectancy will be different depending on where you live in the world. There are many factors that will determine how long we might live, and they are not equal across the world.

So, I looked into the numbers a little deeper.

According to the United Nations, the current average age at death for people across the world is around 73.3 years, which is 3822 weeks. For women, the average is 76 years (3963 weeks/912 months), and for men, 70.7 years (3687 weeks/848.4 months). It is well known that women, on average, live longer than men.

Weeks are an uncomfortable unit of measurement, and 4000 does seem a lot. Years can feel generous, decades abstract. But weeks are tangible. They are ordinary, repetitive, something that we feel and easy to waste. It is seven days of life — the here and now — they come and go. 

Many of us spend the first half of life building careers, working, raising families, chasing stability, and waiting for the “right time”. Somewhere along the way, we forget to ask what we actually want our remaining weeks to look like. We assume there will always be more time later.

There won’t.

Our time on this planet is finite, and the clock is always ticking. Life is full of numbers and averages.

The Writer's Life: The Writer As An Observer of Life - A Hospital Visit

 

A writer rarely enters a room without quietly taking notes. Not with pen and paper; that would be too obvious, but with something far more instinctive. I find myself observing what is going on around me, and the potential for a story forms in my mind.

A writer notices the way a conversation develops or stalls, the glance that lingers too long, and the sigh that says more than words ever could. The looks on the faces of everyone in the room, friendly or grumpy, hostile even, every room has its own look and character.

I was in one such room last Friday, when I had to pay a visit to a local hospital. A hospital waiting room is not a place where most people would want to be. Uncertainty about our health takes most of us there, unless you were in support or there to assist someone.

The hospital was busy; they always are, but the first thing I had to do was find the waiting room. Report to Ward 34, I was told by my local surgery. I diligently wrote down the details, including a long abbreviation that must have been code for something. It was the only writing that I had done for a few days.

Ward 34? I began to wonder about all the other wards (33 of them), and then how many more there were after 34. The hospital was a big place. I arrived at the main reception, where I noticed someone, who looked like he might be a volunteer, advising others on where to go.

“Do you know where you need to go to?” He asked.

“Ward 36.” I replied, without realising that I had given the wrong number.

“I’ll take you to the lift. From there you go to the second floor and turn left, and the waiting room for Ward 36 is at the end of the corridor.”

The Writer's Life: When Illness Strikes - The Art and Fear of Being a Writer

 

I recently caught a winter cold, which turned into an infection,  or it came with it, just before Christmas. It was just a cold, or so I thought.

The common cold had taken a backseat in recent times, as COVID-19 got all the headlines. But it has been around a long time; there are about two hundred strains of it. It was just waiting its turn, or a new strain was around. Old or new, I got it from somewhere.

And it was a lingering cold.

A continuous cough is not just something that comes with COVID-19; mine from this simple cold lasted three weeks, and I’m still not over it. The cough pounds away at the rib cage — it’s like going ten rounds with Mike Tyson at his peak.

It all meant that I struggled to write. That’s the way it is when I’m ill. I might have good intentions, that having all that time,  I will write. In reality, that doesn’t happen. Being ill drains any desire to do anything, other than to get over it.

You eat a meal without tasting a bite. You read a message twice and still don’t absorb it. Watch a YouTube video, without taking it in. Somewhere along the way, you forget to write. The hours drag on.

And this is where writing lives.

To be a writer is to exist half a step removed from the world, constantly translating experience into language in a way that, hopefully, someone will like and understand. The writer is always watching, listening, and storing fragments away in the mind for future use. Even in moments of rest, or illness, thoughts are working, shaping sentences, rehearsing conversations, rewriting endings that never happened.

This is the art of it.

The Writer's Life: Becoming AI — What's a Writer To Do?

I never used to check my writing with an AI detector before joining Medium. And even when I first published on the platform, I didn’t check.

But then I read a few stories from writers who indicated their writing, or some of it, had been flagged as AI by an AI detector checker. I thought that I had better check my stories just to see.

For the most part, they pass with a big zero.

But occasionally, I receive a return that tells me that anywhere from 3% to 10% is most likely AI. My usual reaction is, “Really?” Often, it is only one line, one sentence, or at most a paragraph. Occasionally, it may consist of just a few words.

I ask myself why would the detector think that an occasional line in a story of several hundred words, or even a few thousand, is most likely AI-written? What is it about the words that makes the detector algorithm think that it has been written by AI? And typically it will say, 100% certain.

For example, the line below.

Of the two, I prefer the astronomical summer because it lasts longer!

It was part of a story I wrote about the two end dates of summer in the UK, meteorological and astronomical. I wrote it for the reason given; the end date of the astronomical summer is later than the other date.

It was a simple enough sentence. Anyone could have written it. But the detector thought that AI wrote that line. It didn’t make sense to me. Was it because I had used a fancy word like ‘astronomical’? Or maybe it was the exclamation mark at the end? Perhaps AI did not think that a human would write that way, to emphasise being happy?

The Writer's Life: Whatever Happened to Storytelling? We All Need Stories.

Whatever happened to storytelling?

It’s a question I’ve found myself asking quite a lot lately.

I read that people want real stories, the personal, authentic glimpses into someone’s life. I was watching a YouTube video on this yesterday, and I thought, “Yes, I’ve been there.” But scroll through your average feed, and you’ll see something else entirely. A parade of how-to guides: how to write better, how to be more productive, how to succeed at something (anything!), how to do this and that.

Then there are the ‘how-to’ stories — which, ironically, often don’t contain much storytelling at all.

They all seem to follow the same formula:

• Identify a problem.
• Explain why it matters.
• Offer a neat solution.
• Finish with a motivational takeaway and a promise of success.

And that’s fine, for a certain type of writing. There’s a huge audience for that kind of thing. The self-help and “personal development” world is thriving. But that’s not always storytelling. That’s instruction. It has a purpose — but it’s not quite the same as sitting someone down and saying, “Let me tell you what happened to me one summer…”

Or, “I wrote a book of good stories that might offer a life lesson or two. Hopefully, you enjoy the read.”

A story doesn’t need to solve a problem. It doesn’t need to teach you how to fix your life or build a better version of yourself. Sometimes, a story just needs to help the reader drift off into a different world for a few minutes — escapism.

But surely, storytelling is, and always has been, about entertainment.

The Truth About Medium, An Interlude - Writing For Pennies - A Poem

Writing for pennies, I wait and dream,

Writing for pennies, is not what it seems.

Writing for pennies, just you and me,

Writing for pennies, stories no one can see.

Writing for pennies, time moves so fast,

Writing for pennies, good times never last.

Writing for pennies, I want my reward,

Writing for pennies, I’m getting so bored.

Writing for pennies, too good to be true,

Writing for pennies, no time to feel blue.

Writing for pennies, for every penny earned,

Writing for pennies, a life lesson learned.

Writing for pennies, where stories unfold,

Writing for pennies, more precious than gold.

Writing for pennies, a tale to be told,

Writing for pennies, I won’t sell my soul.

I originally published this poem on Medium in early September. 

The Truth About Medium - Part Six - Here's the One About Money

 

This post covers my earnings at Medium for 2024-25. 

2024 earnings from the time I joined the Medium Partner Program to the end of December.

Sep — $11.55

Oct — $7.47

Nov — $36.52

Dec — $10.19

2025.

Jan — $2.49

Feb — $1.46

Mar — $2.04

Apr — $2.88

May — $0.63

Jun — $2.74

Jul — $1.24

Aug — $0.54

Sep — $0.04 

How Son of My Father Found Its Name - The Story Behind a Book Title, and a Half-Forgotten Song

In 2022, I wrote a book called Son of My Father.

I remember the moment the title came to me. I was pacing around my home, thinking — searching for a phrase that might hold the whole story together. Titles can be elusive things, they are jotted down, forgotten, some look great, then they don’t. I had a handful of ideas, each discarded for one reason or another. 

None seemed to bring the chapters together in the way I wanted.

At one stage, I had an idea that I felt could really work — to open each chapter with a subheading drawn from a song of the time. A piece of music that had shaped not only my personal experiences, but also the atmosphere of the era I was writing about. I imagined each song acting as a lyrical thread connecting memory, mood, and meaning to the story.

Then reality intervened. Copyright.

Yes, “fair use” might have allowed me to borrow a few lines, but even that felt like a legal grey area. The deeper I looked, the more it became a potential minefield of permissions and costs. Reluctantly, I let the idea go.

Still, once music had entered the conversation, I couldn’t get it out of my head. Songs have a way of unlocking memory, and as I sifted through those from my past, one stood out: Son of My Father, a 1972 hit by Chicory Tip.

I can’t say the band were favourites of mine, nor that the song had any special place in my life at the time. I remember it being played on the radio and Top of the Pops, but I was more into music by T Rex, Slade, Sweet and ELO. Years later, the song — and something in its story — resonated. It felt as though it was an ideal title for the book.

Here’s the song:

I later discovered that the title had been used before — in books, in other contexts — but that didn’t matter. For me, it fit.

Because although my book isn’t solely about my relationship with my dad, he is the presence that runs through it. The man, the mystery. As he left my life almost fifty years ago now, the book is most of what I know about him.

Writing Son of My Father was, in part, an act of discovery — not just about the past, but about what remains when memory fades and imagination takes its place. 

Read more reflections like this here.

 

Image by Tibor Janosi Mozes from Pixabay

I Don't Have An Amazon Kindle - Can I Still Read Kindle E-Books? (Yes, You Can!)

You don’t need an Amazon Kindle device to enjoy Kindle books. Learn how to read Kindle e-books on your phone, tablet, computer, or web browser — all completely free and easy to set up.

No Kindle? No Problem!

Actually, I do have an Amazon Kindle — a very old one which once belonged to my mother. After she passed away, it was given to me in a box of old technology. I recall it was full of old mobile phones, calculators, various other devices, and a Kindle. I just thought it was a tablet, until I saw the name.

Once I figured out how to turn it on, I noticed that she had an extensive collection of mostly crime fiction books. She liked a good detective story. I did read a few chapters of my own book on the Kindle!

Having written a book, an e-book that is available on Amazon (The picture, top right of page), I sometimes get asked.“But I don’t even own a Kindle… How do I read it?”

It was a good question, one that, at the time, I didn’t have an answer to.

So, I looked it up.

The good news? I discovered that you don’t actually need a Kindle device to read Kindle e-books.

Amazon has made it easy to access Kindle books from almost any device — smartphone, tablet, laptop, or even straight from your web browser. These are the main alternative to Kindle device options.

1. Use the Free Kindle App on Any Device

Surprise, surprise, there is an app for it. The easiest way to read Kindle books without a Kindle is to download the free Kindle app. It’s available for iPhone and iPad (App Store), Android phones and tablets (Google Play) and Windows PCs and Macs.

Once installed, sign in with your Amazon account, and your Kindle library, showing the books you have bought or downloaded for free, will then appear.

2. Try Kindle Cloud Reader — Read in Your Browser

The Truth About Medium - Part Five - Let's Talk About Money

One of Medium’s biggest attractions for writers is the chance to earn money right away. You join the Medium Partner Program (MPP), write, publish, and with every read from a paying member, you earn a little something in return.

Exactly how much per read? Well, that’s the mystery.

There’s a formula used — some calculation involving views, reads, and “engagement.” I’ve tried to figure it out, but like many others, I never cracked the code. Only Medium and the algorithm have the answer to that.

Still, some writers were making good money on Medium. It felt like if you show up, engage, publish regularly, and build a loyal following, you too could join the platform’s top earners.

Then comes the reality check.

Where the Money Comes From

Let’s start with where the money for writers actually comes from. It’s drawn from the pool of funds that paying members contribute — the same members who subscribe through the MPP.

Here’s where things get tricky.

How many people join Medium to just read? And how many sign-up hoping to write and earn? We roughly know the number of members, but Medium doesn’t break it down. If most members are writers, not readers, then for every person making a decent monthly, "side-hustle" income — say $500 — hundreds of others would need to make almost nothing. The money doesn’t stretch far enough.

The reason is simple: the money writers earn comes largely from the same pot they pay into. If the membership is mostly writers, it is clear that most cannot get back more than their membership fee.

If Medium had millions of paying readers who didn’t write, the pot would be much bigger, and there’d be more to go around.

Medium’s Business Model