I have inadvertently read a lot of shortform on Medium which is one of the main reasons I am finding them to be the worst. Again, specifically on Medium, I cannot see the actual length of a shortform before opening and starting to read it. A 1 minute read is actually a lot longer than 150 words. I know because I had to do presentations in under 60 seconds, and I would script them, and would always go well above 150 words. On Medium what I actually get more often than not is a 20-30s read that either lacks any value, says something incredibly obvious or sells self help. The number of writers I had to mute over the years and click the “show me less of this” option has now easily taken up two working days’ worth of my time and while I know I sound harsh, I do have one life and don’t like people wasting it. Collectively authors have wasted more of my time with shortform over the last 8 years on Medium than poorly written longform articles. Sure, it’s anecdotal evidence, but to me it says something, hence the headline.