The thing is that their job, as Tony's regular gloatposts about a million members and profitability curves indicate, is to improve the company's bottom line.

Quality writing, and writer satisfaction, are entirely irrelevant, except to the extent that they might affect income.

If Medium can make a profit as an online casino in which the population of the Indian subcontinent and other low/middle-income economies chuck $5 in the pot each month in the hope of winning $25 by gaming the system, while Medium skims its take off the top, that is a result for them.

All they need to do is maintain enough plausible content in the shopwindow - like the massage parlour frontage of a brothel - to convince enough people (especially potential buyers) of their seriousness as a platform.

And they know they have a sufficient coterie of Stockholm-syndrome, Kool-Aid-drinking, Panglossian cheerleaders to keep that scam going.

Cynical? Moi?