A year of Medium membership and the Partner Programme — has it been worth it?

I had an email this week reminding me that my first year of Medium membrship was coming to an end, which prompted me to look back at some of my stats for the year. When I took out the membership, I did it with the intention that I was going to be posting more stuff on here through the Partner Programme and my income from that would cover the cost of membership.

Now, I know the two things aren’t connected and you can continue to write and publish here without signing up as a member, but I chose membership for two reasons. First, that there was enough on here that I wanted to read that it made sense to remove the paywall and second, if I was going to look to be part of this then it was only fair that I was doing my bit to contribute to those whose posts I was reading. For me, this is a little bit of fun on the side and a way to work out some of my thinking on issues, but for others it is how they’re making a living and so I could make a small contribution to that wider economy.

How’s it worked? Well, over the year I’ve made enough from readers (thank you all) to cover the amount I paid out for membership and have a little bit more on top of that. To be clear that’s a little bit more in the sense of paying for a takeaway or two, not covering my rent or putting a down payment on my first…