Still Ineligible For Medium’s Partner Program

When will Medium extend its partner program to Brazil, India, and Thailand?

I’ve been holding my breath — and I really mean it — for Medium to extend its partner program to India.

There’s a lot I’d like to write: personal essays, essays on folklore from India, travel stories, and other experiences. But I’d also like to generate some income from it, especially since I got out of software engineering and jumped full-time into writing towards the end of the pandemic in 2020.

A Lot of Medium Members Unsubscribed Because They Couldn’t Avail Partner Program Benefits

When it comes to tech features and online earning opportunities, readers/writers from countries that don’t come under the first-world-west either have to wait for a long time or just make peace that certain things will never be available in their countries.

I joined Medium years back and hoped that India would soon be included in the partner program, but it didn’t happen, and, at some point, I gave up and stopped renewing my Medium subscription.

A lot of other members left too. Especially members from Brazil, India, and Thailand.

And Then The New Update Was Announced

What we had given up on suddenly came back into view when Medium announced their recent updates. It was wonderful on so many counts.

The first being: better content. Just before I left Medium, my timeline was littered with the crappiest articles that promised to make me a millionaire if I woke up at 5:00 AM, or by reading 52 books a year, or by writing listicles that solved people’ problems. But most tunnels have a light at the end. This one certainly did, because when the content quality had dropped to its lowest point, the team at Medium came up with an announcement that then came the promised better content with their new update. Awesome!

The second: entry into the partner program. I read it twice and pinched myself to be sure I wasn’t dreaming. Well, the feature was a bit delayed but they promised that it shouldn’t take longer than October 2023. These words put a wide and grateful smile on my face.

And I Re-subscribed

I monitored my timeline for a few days and noticed a distinct improvement in the content quality, as promised. Well, they had delivered the first feature, and I was sure they’d deliver the other features too.

The credit card was soon out of my backpack and a new subscription was done. I was excited to participate once again on the platform that looked like it was back on track to delivering its original promise of high-quality content and personal essays.

Back in The Waiting Loop

On October 1st, I opened the app with bated breath and went to the partner program page to sign up. But alas! It gave me the same old error message — that my country (India) was not yet supported.

Maybe they’re in the process of rolling out the feature.

That’s what I told myself and decided to check again later. But nothing changed the next day, and the next, and the next. Today, on 4th October, I still get the same message, and unfortunately, there’s no update from Medium either.

Features Can Be Delayed; But Not Status-Updates

Being an ex software engineer, I know delays can happen for all sorts of reasons like compliance issues, integration issues, and a zillion other obsacles.

The feature being delayed, although unpleasant, is still okay, but not getting a status update for a feature that so many are waiting for, is not at all okay. It makes me wonder if the team at Medium really cares about keeping it’s word.

All I’ll say at this point to Team Medium is — it’s alright if the feature is delayed, but we would really really appreciate a status update that keeps us in the loop of the progress and the likely rollout of the partner program being available to members from Brazil, India, and Thailand. Surely, that can’t be too difficult.

Thank you!