About Tarot on Medium
I would love to be writing a different story . . . .
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I’d hoped that writing about Tarot on Medium — in a serious (but not boring!) way would open up the topic for a broad spectrum of readers. That’s not going to happen.
But a few people (not quite 100) have followed Perspectives on Tarot, and others have also read and clapped for individual stories. So it’s been worthwhile.
For those folks, I wanted to explain why I won’t be offering any new Tarot content on Medium. If you’d like to see more of my writing, I publish a free Tarot newsletter on Substack, and there’s a link at the end of this piece.
But for the record, I want to share what I’ve decided about the prospects for writing about Tarot (or actually, anything) on Medium.
The Algorithm Problem
If you search using the keyword “Tarot” in the Medium search box, you will see a handful of stories published a year ago, or longer. That’s it.
If you use Google to search for “Tarot on Medium,” and take the first path returned, you will go to a different Medium page, featuring a number of stories with the tag “Tarot.” In fact — more than 6K stories, by 2K writers, according to Medium. The most recent will show up first.
Medium’s algorithms are terrible in general, and even worse for niche topics like Tarot. So if you’re looking for a new Tarot writer or publication on Medium, you should go straight to this link, rather than using the search box.
But keep in mind that even if you follow authors who interest you, their work may never be in your feed. No one understands how Medium “decides” what individual readers will “see,” but whatever method they use was never good and has gotten much worse.
The Content Problem
I recently received an email update from a general interest publication I could choose to write for, in the sense that I’ve been accepted as a writer. According to the update, this publication now has 12,000 accepted writers.
And that number is for one publication, for writers who have gone through at least a minimal process of scrutiny. The total number of people self-publishing their writing on Medium, or via the thousand or so active publications is mind-boggling.
So how could you find a Tarot writer whose work is good, and would interest you? I don’t know of any method other than patient effort.
As far as I can tell, there is no correlation between the number of followers and the quality of writing. That’s in part because another Medium problem has been “ghost followers,” who (for some reason no one understands) open free accounts and follow writers at random. Even I got a lot of them, though the flood seems to have slowed down.
So no luck there as a guideline.
Again as far as I can tell, the only path is to start auditioning Tarot-tagged stories. Based on my own rough scan, I’d say the first few dozen stories returned on a tag search will comprise three different groups. About a quarter seem to be general stories that include the word Tarot in some way — even as a joke. Another quarter appear to be personal essays or reflections that have a Tarot aspect.
Of the roughly one-half that are actually “about” Tarot, most seem to be either instructional, inspirational, or a combination of both. Though I didn’t read all the way through any of these, I took a quick look at several, and saw some personable writing, with a variety of approaches. The writer I liked best, of those I browsed, was Jade Eby.
In closing . . .
In creating Perspectives on Tarot, I wanted to develop something with the look of a magazine, and the substance of a good book. That’s still (sort of) possible, even though the current Medium default format is designed for “frictionless reading” on a phone. But it doesn’t really matter, because almost no one will see the publication unless I can build a huge following elsewhere and hound them to become Medium members.
As I’ve suggested, problems at Medium are not specific to Tarot writers. But the hope of reaching an audience for serious (but not boring) Tarot was my only remaining reason to write or publish on the Medium platform.
If you’re reading this, please enjoy the content I’ve left behind in Perspectives on Tarot! And if you are seeking further explorations, I hope you will have a look at my free Substack newsletter. I’m raising questions, sharing ideas, and pushing boundaries — every week.
Warmest regards, Cynthia