Platform Decay & Metric Worship

Autopsies of platforms that replaced judgment with metrics, discovery with distribution and culture with optimization loops.

Platform decay is not collapse. It is erosion. Incentives drift, metrics harden into doctrine and platforms quietly replace judgment with numbers. This hub documents how systems designed to distribute culture end up consuming it.

A large institutional hall with rows of open books preserved under glass cases, displayed in a symmetrical archival layout.

Formatting the Abyss: A Requiem for Medium

An autopsy of Medium’s clap economy, showing how visibility metrics push writers toward safe formats, self-censorship and obedience while ambiguity, risk and real thinking quietly disappear.

A crowd of people stands inside a large cathedral-like interior filled with glowing screens displaying a repeating letter symbol, while a central figure faces raised hands projected above, with stained-glass windows and neon lighting blending religious architecture and digital imagery.

The Medium Is the Mirage

Medium's engagement incentives encourage clickbait self-help narratives, manufactured urgency and exaggerated income claims over accountable guidance.