“What works” on the web is not a mystery to publishers any more. The secrets of scaling are no longer confined to a sophomore’s sock drawer in a Harvard dorm. This new age of digital enlightenment means that when organisations are born they come with built-in expectation inflation. No recent journalism launches have attracted the same interest as last week’s Vox.com debut and the FiveThirtyEight’s that preceded it.
The Guardian’s Emily Bell on the future of web journalism and web-based writing in general.
In the same piece, she later makes a reference to Ev William’s Medium which is, she says, “devising ways for writers to publish without having to edit, or be paid.” Those last three words actually crystalized one of the reasons why I’ve been so ambivalent about Medium. I’ve wanted to be more onboard, but there’s something about the site that’s very “writers write for love, not money” that is the very opposite of appealing to me.