My 300th Article Of Gratitude For Every Published Headline
It took me 200 articles to say hello to the world, my readers, and followers. As I hit another milestone — 300 articles — I find that this time I’d like to talk a lot less about me, and a lot more about you, and because while a simple thank you can go a long way, I thought celebrating 300 articles on Medium might go further if I share my thoughts on you, my readers, a community of nearly 3,500 individuals, each with unique stories, struggles, hopes, dreams, successes and stumbles along the way. With that in mind, I came up with six very distinctive reader types that have honoured me with their read-time over the last eight years on this platform.
You may or may not recognise yourself, and if you don’t, I would love for you to describe the type of reader you think you are. Perhaps we’ll even land on 16 different reader types, just as Myers-Briggs ended up with 16 personality types.
The clapper
The well-intentioned reader who barely ever reads, but claps the living crap out of my story. How do I know? Well, when there are more fans than reads in the stats, it’s pretty darn clear. But hey, I don’t judge, it’s a form of fandom that I still appreciate very much, and it does ultimately help boost my ego as a writer and attracts more readers later on.
I can also understand that you’re probably following me thanks to my lesser-known articles on writing or LEGO and all the tech and accessibility stuff is not really your thing, but you still want to show your appreciation. I admit, I sometimes do that myself. Having said that, I do encourage you to give a read to some of those stories that you feel might be outside your comfort zone, as you never know what you might learn or whom to pass the article on.
The commenter
If you’re one of them, let me put it this way: every comment you write, I truly appreciate, and I genuinely do my best to respond to everyone. Don’t get me wrong, claps are great and each one of them I take as a small hug of encouragement to keep going, to keep writing, to stay true to my style. Comments, however, go beyond encouragement, even the ones that don’t quite agree with me.
I wrote about this a while back, so I’d rather not regurgitate the same, but readers who comment, who have something to say, I find to be extremely inspiring. Out of the 300 articles I have written so far on this platform, roughly 50 of them were triggered by comments. These conversations let me into your space in a way that the article on its own could never do. My message suddenly turns into a dialogue, and for every single one of them I thank you. It’s an honour, every time, having a conversation with you.
The highlighter
I know not everyone loves ye, but I do. You wanna highlight the living shite out of my articles? Go for it. Turn it into a bloody Christmas tree for all I care. In fact, I do care. Do it. Every highlight means a read, and every read means a few cents for me. Hey, I am honest enough to admit that I like getting a few cents for every read! 🤷♂️
Readers will highlight sentences, words, entire paragraphs for various reasons, and honestly, what those reasons are, is entirely their business. However, there is a hidden benefit that readers who highlight, bring. I see it as a form of conversation or feedback, where they let me — the writer — know that something caught their eyes, resonated with them, or simply sounded special enough to take the time to highlight. Seeing what readers consider important can serve as a clue and sometimes even drive the direction of my writing.
The bookmarker
I’m not sure about others, but I like seeing articles getting bookmarked. I know it doesn’t instantly translate to a read, and heck, it might never, but it still tells me something significant — the headline alone was intriguing enough for them to bookmark the article.
So, if you’re one of my readers who occasionally or periodically bookmarks some of my stories, take your time, no need to rush reading them. I didn’t rush writing my article, so no reason for you to rush reading them either. You read it when it makes sense to you. I am grateful you found it interesting enough at first sight to add it to your collection of articles to read later. Namaste! 🙏
The superfan
A few times a month I see something that always warms my heart and is such a massive encouragement. First it’s a clap from a reader, then a few minutes after, a follow, then a subscribe, and occasionally even a referral! Then another clap on another article, and some more claps on a couple more articles. This is when I know I have a real superfan. I managed to get a reader that just devours story after story. In a world where attention-span is fairly low, to see someone spend 20–30 minutes reading just my articles is one of the most genuine confirmation that I must be doing something right.
To every fan, superfan, recurring reader, I can only say one thing — thank you from the bottom of my heart. Your continued support, belief and trust in my writing is not something I take for granted. I owe each one of ye, not just gratitude but the responsibility of staying true to who I am as a writer, keeping the quality of my articles up to a certain standard and do my best to give you value every time you decide to read an article of mine.
The rabid hater
Because let’s face it, some readers have been raised by wolves, but somehow still evolved enough to use a computer and type their keyboard-warrior comments. More often than not the comments are dripping of utter lack of intelligence, extreme hate, incapacity to string together a civilised response and are a sad reminder and representation of everything that’s wrong with the world.
I’ll be honest, it’s tough reading hateful comments, and if there is a truly difficult lesson that I had to learn on this platform is not to respond with anger to haters. Having said that, I also can’t just ignore them, so I try educating many of them by suggesting they try having a more civilised conversation. It seldom works, and I know it’s like throwing pearls in front of a pig, but I try, nevertheless, because I always hope there is a teachable moment in there somewhere. If nothing else, these are the readers who inadvertently taught me how to have a level-headed argument with someone about to explode.
Whether you find yourself in any of the above six categories, ultimately, it doesn’t matter. Each and every one of ye taught me something about writing, and for that, I am eternally grateful. You see, it’s not really so much the lessons about writing you taught me, but lessons about life and people. Be that technology, LEGO, writing or accessibility, it all ultimately leads back to people and their lives. The things that matter to you, the reader, and me, the writer and what connects us is the human condition, our shared struggles, hopes, and dreams. Every time you read a story of mine, I get to know more of you and the world.
Thank you all, and here’s to another 300 articles. 🍻
Attila Vago — Software Engineer improving the world one line of code at a time. Cool nerd since forever, writer of codes and blogs. Web accessibility advocate, LEGO fan, vinyl record collector. Loves craft beer! Read my Hello story here! Subscribe and/or become a member for more stories about LEGO, tech, coding and accessibility!
