Every writer has a writing procedure, stages that he follows, or a process that became his routine after writing tens of articles.

Turning your witting stages into a routine is lucrative. It saves time and effort because your brain starts dealing spontaneously with frequent situations.

Your unconsciousness takes care of the little details and preserves the smoothness of the movement between stages; while you focus on the content of the story.

Those habits can be irrelevant to the writing process. For example, preparing a drink, listening to Beethoven, setting the mood, etc.

Or it can be relevant to it. For instance, brainstorming, listing the main points, writing the first draft, etc.

In this article, I will suggest a habit that was beneficial for my articles. I call it ‘write today and publish tomorrow’.

The name of the habit explains itself. If I wrote an article today, I do not publish it until the next day.

The reason behind this behavior is psychological. I attempt to trick my mind to give myself unbiased feedback about my article.

Once I finish writing an article, I could not give myself fair feedback. I would either be very favorable or very unfavorable. In both cases, I could not be sure if the article is good enough to be published.

There are many reasons behind this state of mind. Firstly, the fatigue. Writing demands a huge mental effort. It is hours of squeezing the mind to generate ideas, styles, and synonyms. Sometimes, especially in journalism, it requires investigations and researches.

Therefore, when you finish writing your piece, your mind will need some rest. Consequently, when you ask about feedback during that critical moment, it fails you.

Secondly, when you read your article directly after finishing writing it, your mind will judge it as a product of its own. In other words, it will judge it on a special scale, which is different than the one it uses to judge others’ writing.

In this case, your mind could either be boastful and give you positive feedback even if your article is not good enough, or cynical and give you negative feedback even if your article is good enough.

There are two tips to solve this dilemma. The first is to send your piece to a friend who could provide you with fair feedback. If you are lucky, you may find someone willing to provide you with unbiased and helpful feedback every time you need it.

I believe that finding someone with those characteristics is very rare. You cannot keep bothering someone by asking him to revise your draft every couple of days. And even if that person exists, he may not be qualified to give you helpful feedback.

Thus, the second tip is more favorable. ‘Write today and publish tomorrow’.

Once you finish writing, shut down your computer and give your brain some rest. You can do any activity except editing your article. Just forget about it until the next day.

The next day, read your article again! I assure you; your mind will give you fair feedback. It will receive it like someone else’s article and revise it on that basis.

This is how you trick your mind to extract fair feedback without bothering someone else.

Success Tip: Write Today and Publish Tomorrow was originally published in New Writers Welcome on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

When your story appears on the home page of a Medium user, the first thing that will attract her attention is the thumbnail. If it is catchy, she will read the title, the subtitle, then will decide if it is worth reading.

People love pictures; we love taking them, we love watching them, and we love clicking on them. It is human nature. Images are desired, communicative, and make life way easier.

As a content creator, you must take advantage of this feature. Alas, many writers spend much effort in the writing process and neglect devoting enough time to choosing a perfect thumbnail.

The power of thumbnails

I have been enough years on YouTube to understand the power of thumbnails. You may create a great video, but the wrong thumbnail will waste all the hard-working.

Think about it that way; if your story appeared to 100 users, that means, according to Medium’s algorithm, those users are more expected to like your story. In other words, they only need a trigger that will persuade them to click.

The trigger is the thumbnail. It should be sufficiently attractive to drive as much traffic as possible to your story.

In this article; you will learn how to choose a winning thumbnail that will optimize your earnings.

1. Depend on a variety of stock images resources.

One of the biggest mistakes, which medium writers commit, is the absolute dependency on Unsplash’s stock. There are plenty of free websites that provide better images.

Yes! It requires additional actions to bring the photo to your article, but it is worth it.

Unsplash has limited stock. Most of the time, we can not find suitable photos for our stories. After clicking next thousands of times, we lose hope and go with a general random image of a cute dog.

Also, it is overused by the creators of Medium and Vocal. The same image can be used in thousands of stories; I am not exaggerating! An overused image has less chance to attract the reader’s attention.

In the article below, I provided a list of 20 websites that contain millions of free images.

List of 20 Websites to Find High-Quality Free Images

I also wrote this viral article about a forgotten website that Provides 78 million free images.

This Forgotten Website Provides You With 78 Million Free Images

If you are lazy, like 99.9% of writers, you can use Google to find free images in no time. See this article.

How to Use Google Advanced Image Search to Find Free Images

2. Personalize your thumbnail

What I mean by personalizing the thumbnail is making it related to you. I will elaborate on two main points.

2.2. Use your own pictures

Medium is more about our personal experiences in life. Stories that follow this path get more attention on the platform. Consequently, personalized thumbnails get more attention too.

Try using pictures of yourself as thumbnails of your stories. And do not worry; they do not have to be professional. In fact, less professional pictures are more favorable because they look natural.

You can also use pictures of your pet if the story’s topic is related. Or you can borrow images of your friends, but ask for their permission first.

2.3. Personalized thumbnail from the stock photos websites

If the previous tip is not working for you, try this one. Stock images’ websites contain many pictures that look less professional.

Instead of using a professional picture of handsome models, use a simple image of a regular guy. The example below illustrates the idea.

3. Give your thumbnail a main character (or object)

Either using your own image or an image from the stock, always give your thumbnail a main character. It could be a person, an animal, or an object (a cactus, for instance).

You do not want to distract the attention of your ‘probable’ reader by a scattered thumbnail! Instead, you should give her a simple and minimalistic thumbnail; attractive and easy to understand.

4. Avoid using text on thumbnails

Unlike the previous tips, which are recommended for different platforms, this tip is tailored for Medium. Using texts on your thumbnail is not recommended.

The reason behind that is the way Medium lists stories on the landing page. As you can see in the picture below, the thumbnail is diminished. Therefore, it will be tiresome for the user to read it.

Moreover, the thumbnail looks even smaller on mobile phones. See the screenshot below. You, as a writer, should think about the way your story appears on all sizes of screens.

5. Use high-quality images

The quality of the image is a wide area, but I will narrow it into three main aspects.

5.1. Size of the image

If you use a stock images website, always download the image in high quality. Mostly, those websites provide you with different quality options. Thus, choose the best one.

The size of the thumbnail should not be less than 1 MB and more than 10 MB. A 3 MB image is perfect.

5.2. Rational edits

If you use an image editor before uploading the thumbnail to Medium, be rational while changing the settings of colors, lights, and shades.

The last thing you want is to make the image looks noisy. A minimalist and clean image, with soft colors and lights, is ideal.

Usually, stock images do not need to be edited. Therefore, you may need to take this step only if the image is yours.

5.3. Dimensions of the image

The recommended size of a thumbnail is the widescreen. 720 pixels x 1280 pixels is an ideal size.

Generally speaking, avoid squares and vertical rectangles.

6. Customize your blog (optional)

Medium users follow hundreds of writers. It is not easy to get the attention of the users every time. Even if they prefer your style over the other writers, they cannot spot your article when it appears on their busy Home page.

To overstep this issue, you may like to customize your blog by using the same template for all your thumbnails.

That way, once they see the thumbnail, they will know that the story is yours. You will get their attention and win the home page race every time.

6.1. How to customize your blog

To customize your blog, you need to use the same template for all your thumbnails. The template will work as a brand for your blog.

The template could be as simple as a purple frame, a notable filter (White & Black, Sepia, Neo, etc.), a distinguished genre of painting (Portrait art, for instance), or just your face.

Note that the customization of your blog will only bring your old readers’ attention to your story. You still need to balance this with a charming image that will reach new readers.

How to Find The Perfect Thumbnail (Complete Guide) was originally published in New Writers Welcome on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

From YouTube’s likes/dislikes to Facebook’s emoji reactions. Reacting to content on social media has different shapes. Yet, the core is one, which is speaking our opinion in one click.

Medium has a reaction system similar to the rating. Instead of liking or disliking, the reader is asked to rate the story out of 50. Therefore, everyone on Medium is a judge.

This system is interesting for two reasons. Firstly, it does not disappoint the content creators as YouTube dislikes do. And secondly, it encourages the reader to react even if she does not love the content.

As a judge, you are supposed to give points to the content creator. You cannot raise a blank panel; it should contain a number.

A well-written and inspiring story deserves 50 claps, which means 50/50. Whereas, A good but not perfect story deserves 40 claps (40/50).

If the story is passable, you can bestow 30 claps (30/50); but if it is average, give no more than 25 claps (25/30).

If the story has many problems in terms of the narration and the grammar, you can give between 10 and 20 claps (10/50–20/50).

Finally, if the story is a piece of junk, then give it 0 claps (0/50). Probably, in this case, you may provide additional written feedback to the reader. But be constructive.

When you read a story on Medium, think about yourself as a judge or a teacher. Reward the diligent students with warm applause, and fortify the weak ones by bestowing fair claps.

The next time you clap, think about it that way; how many points out of 50 does this post deserve?

Read more short posts like this one

• You Should Write For This Publication
• Pros and Cons of Writing Short Posts
• List of 20 Websites to Find High-Quality Free Images

Why Give 1 Clap When You Can Bestow 50? was originally published in New Writers Welcome on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Let me break it to you; you will not have the tremendous success that you dream of when your piece gets published by a big publication.

That is the fact that many writers know. Big publications are not the key to success. They will only waste your time by sending you tens of notes in return for seven claps after you get published.

If you want to become a successful writer, do not write for big publications, and here is why.

1. Time-consuming

Submitting a story to a big publication is a nightmare. It is an experience that I hate to go through.

It is time-consuming. Some publications can make you wait for ten days until they publish your article or return to you with an upsetting note.

When your article gets published after a long week of waiting, you will mostly lose interest in it. It is not as exciting as publishing the piece in less than 48 hours or less.

The process takes a long time because they receive hundreds of submissions. Some publications have thousands of writers. Thus, you have to wait in line.

2. Does not worth it

I can wait in the line; I have been doing this for my whole life. I do not complain about it. But if I will wait for two weeks, it should be worth it.

Alas, it does not. Publishing your articles in big publications is like New Year’s day; you expect something exciting to happen after the countdown, but nothing happens.

You do not need to write for big publications. Your article could perform better if you published it directly on your blog.

Writing for big publications is a disappointment. Check these stats of articles published recently on The Startup; a +746K followers publication.

Visit one of those big publications and do your investigations by yourself. You will be surprised by the number of claps and interactions the articles get.

Is there a reason behind the failure of articles published in big publications? I cannot provide a sure answer to this question. But -I suppose- the reason behind that failure is the immense amount of articles published every day. It is hard for your piece to sand out when it gets published besides tens of other stories at the same time.

2.2 My experience

I have been through this frustrating experience. As a human rights activist, I wrote an article about the death of 6,500 workers from many countries like India and Pakistan in Qatar.

Qatar Worked 6,500 Laborers to Death

I wanted this article to go viral for its importance. Therefore, I published it on a big publication that has 19K followers. Sadly, the outcome was disappointing.

I want to seize this opportunity and invite you to read and interact with the article. The way Qatar is enslaving Asian and African workers is shocking. It is a story that is worth going viral.

3. Write for small publications

Instead of wasting your time and effort on big publications, write for the small ones. Publications with less than 5K followers are undervalued.

Contrary to big publications, small publications accept your submitted article in less than an average of 12 hours.

The editors are more humble and understanding. Most of the time, they will publish your article immediately without sending you any notes.

The submission rules are basic. The submission process itself is simple. Instead of the irritating procedure that you have to follow in big publications, which is more complex than applying for a visa, you only need to write a response to some article (like the one below) expressing your desire to join the publication.

Write for “New Writers Welcome”

3.2 My experience

My favorite publication on Medium is New Writers Welcome. I had many successful experiences with this 3.5K followers publication.

My most successful with New Writers Welcome is this article that reached 7.9K readers and had 22K views.

This Forgotten Website Provides You With 78 Million Free Images

You can also check these articles that made considerable success in this publication.

• I Will Help You To Get 100 Followers In 24 Hours
• This is What I did to Become a Top Writer on Medium
• 100 Followers In 24 Hours (Step By Step)

Success Tip: Don’t Write for Big Publications was originally published in New Writers Welcome on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Facebook is an amazing platform. It gathers billions of people from all over the world in one place, and it is the easiest social media platform to access in many poor countries.

To make it clear. I am not here to get into a controversial debate. Everyone has the right to hate Facebook. I -myself- detest Facebook for many reasons. But after all, like any other social media platform on the internet, Facebook has its shiny side.

One of the features that make Facebook stand out is the groups. For those who are not familiar with the concept. Facebook groups are online communities that gather people of the same interest.

In this article, we will have a look at groups that are beneficial for Medium writers.

Before beginning, I would love to invite you to my Facebook account. Let’s be friends!

1. Groups for Medium writers

Medium on Feedium

As the description says, Medium on Feedium is a place for Medium writers and bloggers to share their work and discuss. You will have the opportunity to meet hundreds of writers. You can give them feedback for their stories and hear their opinion about yours too.

The group is more about sharing articles. So do not be shy and feel free to share your last story on Medium with a growing community of 930 members.

Medium Writers

Sam Olliver is making a great effort to keep the group well customized. What I love about it are the professional purple posters and GIFs that Olliver designs.

I noticed that he is the only one posting on the group. But maybe this could change in the future since it is newly created.

The group’s goal is to help Medium writers get reads, claps, and followers. It is also a place where writers share tips, tools, and pieces of advice.

New Writers Welcome

This is the official Facebook group of New Writers Welcome publication on Medium. Robert Ralph is doing a great job in keeping the group friendly and welcoming. The members are kind and eager to help other writers.

Motivation, tips, feedbacks, polls, support, discussions, and writing competition; New Writers Welcome’s Facebook group is a combination of all these things. It is the warmest home for Medium writers on Facebook.

2. Groups for authors

New Writers and Authors

Maybe you are one of those authors who started as bloggers. And probably you think it is time to go big and write your first novel. Or perhaps you are thinking about collecting your poems in one book and publishing it on Amazon.

This group has an amazing community of 55.7k members that will guide you through the journey of publishing your first book. They will answer your questions, recommend tips and pieces of advice, and motivate you when you feel unenthusiastic.

Independent Authors

This is an active forum for authors to share solutions, tips, and recommendations. If you encountered a problem while writing your book, you will find a solution in this 15.4k members group.

After publishing your book, you can promote it there. Just be kind and do not spam the community with tons of posts every day.

Amateur Writers Group

As the name indicates, Amateur Writers Group is dedicated to amateurs. If you are at the beginning of writing your first masterpiece, then maybe you should join this active community of 26.5K friendly members.

This group is made for amateurs. Therefore, all kinds of questions can be asked without being afraid of harsh judgments and demotivating comments.

Writers Helping Writers

Writers Helping Writers is a big group of 306.8K members. It is an opportunity to learn from the amateurs’ mistakes, benefit from the professionals’ tips for success, and get answers from a wide range of writers.

It is wise to get advice from people who were in your shoes. Before making a step that you doubt, ask for guidance, and people will be glad to help.

Best Facebook Groups for Medium Writers was originally published in New Writers Welcome on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Qatar is a tiny but super-wealthy country in the Arab Gulf with a GDP worth 183.47 billion US dollars (2019)[1] and a population of 2.8 million inhabitants. In 2014, the Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence accused Qatar of sheltering and hosting international blacklisted jihadi moneymen like Jarallah al-Marri. Soon after, the country was accused by Trump of financing terrorism, which spark a diplomatic crisis in 2017 between Qatar and the rest of the middle east[2].

Today, Qatar’s international image is discredited because of its circulation in terrorism and violence domestically and globally. Therefore, the country is spending a huge amount of its petrol-based wealth on beautifying its image. One of its tactics is hosting international events.

Qatar will host FIFA World Cup 2022, the greatest football demonstration of all time. Unsurprisingly, securing the honor to host the tournament was not entirely legitimate. In 2020, the US justice department accused Qatar of bribing FIFA officials to vote in favor of rewarding the Arab country the 2022 World Cup. The accusation is related to the 2015 FIFA corruption scandal, which toppled the institution’s president Sepp Blatter[3].

Organizing the tournament will not gain Qatar any considerable instant results. Instead, it will improve their image for the long term. Qatar is eager to sell an industrialized image of a peaceful and welcoming state. A hybrid version of Cool Japan strategy[4]. Yet, while Japan has completely changed from a Nazi nation to a great liberal country, Qatar is clinging to its violent and bloody nature.

Home of two giant media platforms that spread anger, pan-Islamism, homophobia, misinformation, and imperial Arabization in the MENA region (Aljazeera and Bein Sports). Accused of funding extremist groups and bribing high football officials. Restricting freedom of speech (Qatar has arrested Muhammad ibn al-Dheeb al-Ajami for writing a poem)[5]. Oppressing women and sexual minorities. And the worst is yet to come.

Eight months ago, The Guardian published a controversial article entitled “6,500 migrant workers have died in Qatar since World Cup awarded”[6]. The author commenced the shocking article with the following sentence, “More than 6,500 migrant workers from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka have died in Qatar since it won the right to host the World Cup 10 years ago.”

About the number of deaths, the author states,

The total death toll is significantly higher, as these figures do not include deaths from a number of countries which send large numbers of workers to Qatar, including the Philippines and Kenya. Deaths that occurred in the final months of 2020 are also not included.

Qatar has proven that nothing can stop it from organizing the tournament. It has an ambitious vision of a megaproject that includes seven stadiums, an airport, dozens of major programs, roads, public transport system, and even a whole new city.

To make this vision come true, Qatar needed millions of workers. According to Human Rights Watch (2013),

More than 1.2 million migrant workers — mostly from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Nepal, and Bangladesh — live and work in Qatar, and that number is increasing rapidly. The country may recruit up to a million additional workers in the next decade to overhaul its infrastructure and build the stadiums required to host the 2022 World Cup.[7]

Under these circumstances, Qatar has committed severe violations of worker rights. Amnesty, which calls the tournament Qatar world cup of shame, has published many shocking facts about the miserable conditions of working in Qatar. Migrant workers stayed unpaid for months[8]. Employers threaten their employees when they attempt to change their jobs. Mark Dummett, the human rights organization’s global issues program director, said that authorities are leaving thousands of workers at the risk of exploitation by unscrupulous employers. He adds, “They have little hope of remedy, compensation, or justice. After the World Cup, the fate of the workers who remain in Qatar will be even more uncertain.”[9]

Qatar labor abuses do not stop here. Reality Check 2021 is a 48-page report about the state of migrant workers’ rights in Qatar, published two days ago by Amnesty. The report reveals the reality behind Qatar’s legal reforms concerning immigrant workers. These reforms, according to Amnesty, have no effect.

In the report’s conclusion, Amnesty states,

Despite warnings from Amnesty International and other organizations about the need to take serious action against abusive employers, the government continues to fail to hold perpetrators to account. On the contrary, abusive employers feel empowered by the government’s lack of action.

In other words, even the legal reforms that Qatar marketed to the international community after pressure from various organizations and authorities, including FIFA, are empty.

6,500 workers died to beautify Qatar’s image. Or at least, this is the number we know; the hidden is more immense. This number is gigantic if we compare it with the number of workers who died during constructing other megaprojects. For instance, three workers died during the construction of Burj Khalifa and Lotte World Tower, 11 died while building the Golden Gate Bridge, about 27 died during the erection of Brooklyn Bridge, and nobody died while structuring Eiffel Tower or Lakhta Center. On the whole, 44 is the number of workers who died during the construction of these six megaprojects combined.

The number looks more alarming and anomalous when we compare it with the previous FIFA World Cup tournaments. To illustrate, 21 workers died during the construction of stadiums that hosted FIFA WC 2018 in Russia[10], and eight died during the construction of 12 venues scheduled to host FIFA WC 2014 in Brazil[11]. On the whole, 33 workers died in two previous tournaments of FIFA WC combined.

The two previous paragraphs give us a notion about the terrible number of people who died in the Qatar massacre. Are we still talking about constructions? Is that a war? Does the organization of a sports tournament deserve all this bloodshed? You decide how to answer these questions!

The international community reaction varied from an organization to another. Human rights institutions like Amnesty and HRW urged the international authorities to take action and stop the bloodshed in Qatar. Many football federations and associations joined the campaign too. The Nordic countries are always in the frontline, especially Sweden. The Swedish national team withdrew from the Qatar training camp in September, while the Swedish football clubs signed an Amnesty International protest demanding the governing body to stand up for the rights of migrant workers in Qatar.

Call for action.

Qatar is a sample of how far an unprincipled wealthy state can go. It does not respect human rights, worker rights, LGBTQ+ rights (check the article below), etc. As long as they can put money in the pockets of corrupted politicians and lobbies in Europe and the USA, they can do whatever they want without any punishment. We must stand against the whole system; from the Qatari moneymen to the FIFA officials.

Premier League Partners with Homophobic Qatari Media Group

It is shameful to allow wealthy states to enslave our fellow humans. It is our duty to stand behind the oppressed workers and the families that lost over 6500 daughters, sons, sisters, fathers, brothers, and mothers.

What can you do

Sign petitions. There are many online petitions that you can sign. Below are some examples:

• This campaign needs you now
• Sign Petition: Boycott Qatar World Cup 2022

Put social pressure on FIFA’s sponsors: VISA, Hyundai/KIA, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, ADIDAS, and Anheuser-Busch InBev.

Use your platform to educate the public about the workers’ situation in Qatar and the 6500-massacre.

Sources and more details

[1] Qatar GDP | 2021 Data | 2022 Forecast | 1970–2020 Historical | Chart | News (tradingeconomics.com)

[2] President Trump Accuses Qatar Of Funding Terrorism (forces.net)

[3] US accuses Qatar of bribing FIFA officials to host 2022 World Cup | MEO (middle-east-online.com)

[4] Cool Japan — Wikipedia

[5] World Report 2013: World Report 2013: Qatar | Human Rights Watch (hrw.org)

[6] Revealed: 6,500 migrant workers have died in Qatar since World Cup awarded | Workers’ rights | The Guardian

[7] World Report 2013: World Report 2013: Qatar | Human Rights Watch (hrw.org)

[8] Qatar: Migrant workers unpaid for months of work on FIFA World Cup stadium — Amnesty International

[9] Amnesty report: Qatar migrant workers trapped and exploited before World Cup | World Cup 2022 | The Guardian

[10] 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia: In Memory of 21 Killed Workers |BWI Home (bwint.org)

[11] Timeline of deaths, accidents at Brazil’s World Cup stadiums | Reuters

An Injustice!

Qatar Worked 6,500 Laborers to Death was originally published in An Injustice! on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Writing on Medium has two flanks. It is enjoyable because you write about topics you love and exhausting because you must do this every day.

A Medium writer should write regularly to keep making money. If she stops doing this, her monthly revenues will decrease.

And here is where short-posts come to save the day.

Pros

• People love reading them. Thus, they will drive immense traffic to your profile and previous articles if the readers like your style. Check the last part of this article for more information.

This is What I did to Become a Top Writer on Medium

• They are easy to write and don’t take much time.
• They keep your profile fresh and updated.

Cons

• They are not payable. Don’t expect to make a fortune out of them.
• You will be obliged to forfeit some important parts of your post to stay within the 150-words limit.

Pros and Cons of Writing Short Posts was originally published in The Shortform on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I have never thought that I could be a Top Writer on Medium. I thought it was a decoration for writers with 10k followers and 6k dollars per month!

Yet, yesterday, I received this email from Medium

GREAT WORK

Ayoub Bouamri, you’re a top writer in the topic of Writing.

Your writing is popular with readers — keep up the good work! The Writing topic page and your profile will now highlight you as a top writer, as well.

I wanted to become a Top Writer on Medium. You know, the esteem and prestige lol! But I am not going to lie; I was not planning for it. It happened by coincidence.

Therefore, I analyzed the stories that granted me this honor. And I will display the outcome of my analysis in the form of a step-by-step guide.

1. Find where you stand out

Since I started my journey on Medium, I was obsessed with the idea of helping other writers to grow on the platform and become better writers.

I published many articles about writing on Medium: Tips, how to get 100 followers, how to find free images, Medium vs Vocal, etc.

Consequently, the majority of my articles had the tag Writing. And these are some of the most successful ones.

• This Forgotten Website Provides You With 78 Million Free Images
• I Will Help You To Get 100 Followers In 24 Hours
• 1000 Reads On Medium Vs 2 Reads On Vocal

Thus, the first step to becoming a Top Writer on a certain topic is to write as many articles about it as you can. Ten articles in one month is an acceptable number.

2.1. Get noticed

Now, I am not here to give you the magic recipe of how to write trending articles. There is no secret way to do this. There is no adequate time to publish your articles, no successful niche for everyone, and especially no magic 100$ Udemy course that will make your articles viral in 2 minutes.

However, you need to trust the process and be patient until your time to shine comes. Write good articles, study the platform and know what people like to read, be active, write for small publications, etc.

When people start noticing you, Medium will automatically recommend you to a vast base of readers.

2.2. My stats

I wrote nine articles about the topic Writing in the last month. The main stats for these articles are 17.1k views, 11.5k reads, and 1637 fans (P.S. I love you).

3. Seize the opportunity

If one of your articles becomes viral, write more articles about that topic. The reason behind this is simple, and I will summarize it in three paragraphs.

Firstly, some people who liked your trending article will start following you to see more posts similar to it. Thus, they are more likely to enjoy another piece from you about the same topic.

Secondly, Mediums algorithms understand what each user wants to read. If a reader spent more time reading your fitness article, she would get more recommendations from you when you write about the same topic, even if she did not follow you.

Thirdly, your future articles have a bigger chance to be featured at the bottom of your trending one. I believe that this option does not drive immense traffic to your articles, but this is not a reason to ignore it.

Finally, enjoy writing about your favorite topics, and great results will come spontaneously. Put enough love and passion in your stories, be patient, and seize your moment when it comes.

This is What I did to Become a Top Writer on Medium was originally published in New Writers Welcome on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

BeIN Sports is a giant media group based in Qatar. It is the exclusive broadcaster of the main sports events in the MENA region (the Middle East and North Africa). It is also an official partner of big football (soccer) associations like FIFA, UEFA, and Premier League.

Since BeIN Sports is a homophobic media group, why are football’s biggest associations and leagues still collaborating with it?

During the halftime of last Sunday’s Chelsea vs Manchester United match, the channel attacked the LGBTQ+ community and the Premier League Rainbow Laces campaign.

The attack started with a statement by Mohammed Aboutrika, a former player on the Egyptian national team and an analyst BeIN Sports.

Aboutrika, who is listed on the terrorist list of the Egyptian authorities, started his attack by describing homosexuality as a sexual abnormality. This concept -sexual abnormality- is widely used in Muslim societies.

He added, “Such phenomenon does not fit our faith, and does not fit our religion [Islam].” Then he backed up his statement with an example from the Quran. He said, “ the biggest punishment that ever happened [in history] is the one Lot’s people received”.

Apparently, by mentioning Lot’s people, Aboutrika was referring to the main story in the Quran that indicates Islam’s position on homosexuality. Briefly, Lot is a prophet according to the Quran, and his people were homosexual. Because homosexuality is a sin (according to the Abrahamic Religions), Allah –God- punished them.

Loti, attributed to Lot’s story, is the Arabic translation of the word gay in English. This example shows the holy place of Lot’s story in the Muslim and Arab minds.

Abutrika mentioned the Quranic verse that celebrates God’s punishment for Lot’s people. God says, “And We made the highest part [of the city] its lowest and rained upon them stones of hard clay.” (The Qur’an, 15:74)

After his short lecture about homosexuality in Islam, Abutrika jumped to urge the Muslim clerks and theologians to sharply attack homosexuality on these occasions.

Abutrika said that homosexuality is against human nature, and he described it as a humiliation to humankind. Then he added, “We all have a role to play, to stand up against this phenomenon [homosexuality].” And he insisted on the fact that Islam fights homosexuality.

He said, “It is a dangerous ideology [homosexuality], and it is becoming nasty, and people are not ashamed of it anymore […] They will tell you that homosexuality is a human right. No! It is not a human right”.

onmtcc on Twitter: ". #Aboutrikaـattacks_LGBTQ @trikaofficial #َQatar #beINSPORTS #PremierLeague #RainbowLaces #LGBTQ #Qatar2022 #FIFA #LiverpoolFC #Chelsea #ManCity #ManUnited #WestHam #Arsenal #Tottenham #allredallequal #TakeAStand @ pic.twitter.com/9amfMejh1R / Twitter"

#Aboutrikaـattacks_LGBTQ @trikaofficial #َQatar #beINSPORTS #PremierLeague #RainbowLaces #LGBTQ #Qatar2022 #FIFA #LiverpoolFC #Chelsea #ManCity #ManUnited #WestHam #Arsenal #Tottenham #allredallequal #TakeAStand @ pic.twitter.com/9amfMejh1R

The Daily Mail condemned the fact that the other BeIN Sports broadcasters sanctioned Abutrika’s attack on homosexuality. Nobody in the whole media group disagreed with him, which means that the giant Qatari media group adopts these ideas.

This leads us to an extensive dilemma. Since BeIN Sports is a homophobic media group, why are football’s biggest associations and leagues still collaborating with it?

BeIN Sports and Aljazeera are the biggest media groups in the Middle East and North Africa. Hundreds of millions of people from this region watch these channels. Their fame in the MENA is similar to CNN in the US and BBC in England. Just imagine the number of people that will receive Abutrika’s hate speech.

BeIN Sports and its official partners like the Premier League and FIFA are endangering the lives of millions of homosexuals in the MENA. Their situation in some radical countries like Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, and Qatar is already unsafe.

The punishment for homosexuality in Islam is death. And the landslide of the MENA societies believes in the divine legitimacy of killing and oppressing homosexuals. For many Muslims, death is leisure for homosexuals; it is better for a gay to be dead than to be homosexual. That being said, Abutrika is just adding fuel to the fire.

Editor’s note: LGBTQ activists around the world have been demanding for over two years that FIFA withdraw from its agreement to host the 2022 World Cup tournament in Qatar because Qatari laws punish homosexuality with flogging, imprisonment, and death. FIFA refuses to consider relocating the tournament. Gay Olympian Tom Daley has recently added his voice to a chorus calling on international sporting bodies like FIFA and the IOC to stop hosting games in nations like Russia and Qatar that refuse to honor international human rights conventions.

Tom Daley: The Olympics Movement Must Reject Homophobia

Premier League Partners with Homophobic Qatari Media Group was originally published in Prism & Pen on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Google Image is a forbidden area for Medium writers. It is a heaven that was never made for us. Billions of high-quality images and millions of categories that we cannot enjoy using. But this website has a backdoor.

Stay away from Google Images! Never use images from Google or any other search engine! That is what they said, but this is not true. In fact, you can use images from Google in your stories if you are cautious enough. This article will guide you to make better use of Google Images.

What is “Creative Commons”?

First of all, let us have a boring conversation about Creative Commons (CC). While preparing this article, I was surprised to find out that CC is a nonprofit organization. In my entire life, I thought that CC was an international law that regulated the use of free-copyright media on the internet.

Anyway, Creative Commons enables internet visitors to share and use creativity and knowledge through free legal tools. In our case, CC means free-copyright images. You can read this article to grasp the fundamentals of CC licensing.

How to use Google advanced image search to find free images.

Firstly, type your search query.

Then click on tools > A new tab will appear > Click on usage rights.

Finally, choose Creative Commons Licenses.

Ona last step: Double-check

To be certain that the image is free-to-use, you should double-check the license.

To do this, copy the link of the image and past it in the search bar of TinEye. Or upload the image if the link is unavailable. This tool will go through the boring procedure and check the license in a few seconds.

Bonus: More free images.

For more free-copyright images, I invite you to read the following articles.

• This Forgotten Website Provides You With 78 Million Free Images
• List of 20 Websites to Find High-Quality Free Images

How to Use Google Advanced Image Search to Find Free Images was originally published in New Writers Welcome on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.