Am I Writing for Myself or for the Algorithm?
I started writing because I loved it. But slowly, likes and shares became my compass.
There is a lot of confusion going inside my head.
What to post, what not to post.
Whether to think about all these different monetization programs or write just to share my thoughts and feelings. There are Medium monetization, X creator revenue, Meta monetization programs, and a lot more options. And we often run after those, and post what our audience wants to hear from us, not what we want to share with them.
I am not sure about you, but at least, that’s what happens to me. Initially, I start writing (let’s say sharing something) because I actually like it. Eventually, I start posting more similar content, just because I am getting that dopamine hit, in the form of likes and shares. And then, I generally start discovering more things that can bring in more dopamine hits for me.
Eventually, I lose track, and when I look back, I am now far away from why I started writing in the first place. Instead of sharing my thoughts and ideas, I am doing full-time work to make my audience happy.
And I feel I am not alone in that. I am sure many of us have similar things going on in our minds. We try out multiple things before something finally works out for us.
I feel, for me it is enough now. I already have:
- A Ghost.org blog where I write about my technical knowledge. I am into web development, people management, and I am also interested in AI and productivity. So I post content over there. It’s more of my professional knowledge.
- Another blog, where I document my life journey, about my thoughts, my family life, parenting journey etc.
- X and Threads accounts where I post memes, tech updates.
- A Quora account, where I used to answer questions, but I don’t do it right now.
You see, there are already a lot of platforms, and sometimes I feel, do I need to do all these? Even though I do it after my office hours, it started feeling like another job I have to do. Another commitment I have to fulfill.
Even with this Medium account, I was trying to do the same thing.
Now here is my question to you guys.
Shall I stop worrying about posting what you would like to hear from me, and start posting content that fits into a niche and gets me views?
Or shall I be myself, and share my raw, unfiltered thoughts, like this one?