Week Eight- A Streetcar named Medium

For my relevant multimedia resource, I’m excited to share with you all Medium.com! Keep in mind the exclamation point, I use it about once a year, and I am that excited to share it. The website is simple enough, with an aesthetically pleasing user face. Now you might be wondering, what is Medium? The website describes itself as, “Everyone’s stories and ideas,” though I’ve found it to be heavily focused on technology and entrepreneurship. Essentially, the website is a space for blog entries which the website aggregates the most popular to the front page and a list of the top 100 blog posts. Bonus points: it even lists next to the blog entries the approximate time the entry would take to read.

I find this website an interesting and useful addition to the use of Reddit. The community is composed of users linked to their actual professional identity. After analysis of Reddit in Writing 105P, I’ve found this a valued addition to websites. It keeps people more accountable to their additions online. For example, if I find an interesting concept or post, I can follow the links to the user and see some of their real life accomplishments. For credibility alone, this is a huge plus for me.

Though this website certainly has an entrepreneurial focus, it has many resources to offer. One of the most relevant posts I found during my Photoshop project was a blog post consistening of links to stock photos described as, “not sucking.” As someone who generally prefers photos that “don’t suck”, it was a huge help in finding photos appropriate for usage (stock, artistic, size). Here is a link to that specific post (https://medium.com/design-ux/62ae4bcbe01b). Anyway, the website certainly has even more to offer. Another aspect I enjoy is an increased social awareness I’ve found on the website. For anyone who has spent more than five minutes on the internet, namely Youtube comments, you’ll find people writing the most horrendous things. On Medium, I find that socially conscious and intelligent posts are applauded. On Medium, you can find a post analyzing the constructs discouraging female engineers in technology just as likely as you’ll find a post on how to get a busy person to respond to your email. Please give Medium a try.