Medium pivots, a big story in the tech press, but the reports center on the company and the publishers, but little focus on the users and their interests.

Medium has zigged and zagged, admirable as a company. I envy their freedom. When I was an entrepreneur, I got one shot at success, no pivots. It must be nice to have the freedom to change course several times, with years of runway at a significant burn rate.

Through all the zigging, the thing that has remained constant at Medium is the high quality and usability of the software. But it's possible for others to do what they do, to be as easy to use, without the uncertainty about its future as an archiving system.

This became especially relevant as people in government, including the president and members of Congress, used Medium to publish official statements. Those should be preserved at a constant location over time. Yes, they will be in archive.org, but we should strive to do better. Technically it's not hard. But economically, one thing Medium has preserved is its control of authors' content. It doesn't move easily.

If Medium were to fail a lot of history will go with it.