Monthly Updates from ILLUMINATION Editorial Team: August 2023
Helpful information summarizing achievements and plans for writers and readers
Our publications are diverse and inclusive. New applications to join our publications are via the writer registration portal. Please add your Medium ID or a link to one of your stories. Details are on our master onboarding pack.
Dear Writers and Readers,
August brought some excitement our way. Since our last update, over 1,000 new writers have joined Illumination Integrated Publications. We now have a community of 23,000+ writers, ranging from beginners to experts, all mingling together. We’re thankful for the captivating stories these creative writers share, making our cherished readers very happy.
Every writer and reader is important to us.
Last month’s notable event was the significant changes that Medium introduced, which positively impacted both writers and readers. These changes have prompted us to update our publishing guidelines to help our writers achieve their goals of increasing their readership and building their audience. We noticed some improvement this month and discussed it briefly below.
In our new guidelines, we touched on MPP requirements, such as the removal of 100 followers and the new requirement of being a paid member. We will do everything within our control and capacity to support our writers, whether they are members or not.
To ensure your content is published promptly, we kindly ask for your patience and request that you submit high-quality content along with copyright-free images. We cannot stress enough how crucial quality is.
Quality is the top priority for Medium when it comes to distributing and promoting stories. Without it, your stories may receive very few views — some, even none at all. This is a reality writers should be aware of and take necessary measures to avoid disappointment. Our guidelines outline these steps and offer valuable resources.
On a positive note, we’re thrilled to see that Medium has boosted many stories from our publications, bringing numerous readers to our writers.
You may check a comprehensive checklist to increase the chance of boosting provided by our chief editor Dr Mehmet Yildiz. This checklist will be invaluable for new writers to enhance the quality of their stories.
Dr. Yildiz has also published an article addressing the most commonly asked question about increasing income from writing on Medium and other platforms.
Great News on More Visibility of Stories After Changes
We are pleased to see that some new writers have made significant strides in boosting their income and expanding their readership. As we explain and illustrate below our stats made good improvement.
Two of our editors have documented their journeys in story format, and we’ve provided links to them here for your inspiration and guidance.
This great story is from Mike Broadly - Healthier Lifestyle, and this inspiring one is from Aiden (Illumination Gaming).
“Now, quality and meaningful engagement are the most important factors for making our stories visible. Here are some key points to remember:
We prioritize well-written articles free of language errors or image issues. Stories with errors may take longer to be published.
If your story doesn’t fit the Illumination theme, we might ask you to move it to a more suitable publication to ensure our readers receive the best content.
Writers who don’t follow our publication rules may experience delays in publishing while issues are resolved via private messages. Due to timezone differences, this process may take several days. To expedite publishing, please consider using our complimentary Slack workspace.
Joining our Slack workspace is optional but highly encouraged. It’s an excellent way to become part of the Illumination community. You’ll find channels for sharing stories, receiving feedback, and collaborating with fellow writers.
To give every writer a fair chance, we accept only one story per writer within a 24-hour period. However, you’re welcome to submit additional stories to our smaller publications tailored to different audiences.”
If you have questions or need assistance, you can reach out to our chief editor, Dr Mehmet Yildiz, in private on Slack, and he will direct your inquiries to the relevant editors. It’s important to note that Dr. Yildiz volunteers their time like all our editors. None of our publications or resources generate any revenue from writers.
Writer Bios in a Collection
From the beginning, we’ve encouraged our writers to share personal bios in their stories. These bios have been curated and shared with our subscribers, allowing readers to get to know the writers better. However, as the number of bios grew, it became challenging to manage them all.
To address this, Aiden has reorganized these bios into a shorter and more manageable format. We understand that our readers are keen to learn about the writers they follow, so you can explore these updated bios in our new collection.
Meet ILLUMINATION Writers from Their Personally Penned Biographies
Learn about contributing writers of ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications on Medium, written by their golden pens.medium.com
If you are interested in earning some cash and increasing your email marketing skills, you may check an opportunity introduced by Aiden in step by step in a recent article. He also created a video about it with clear instructions.
Editor Biographies in a Collection
We introduce our new editors and collect those stories in a collection curated by ILLUMINATION-Curators.
We recently introduced a few new editors.
Editorial Profile of Aiden (Illumination Gaming)
Editorial Profile of Kurt Dillon
Editorial Profile of Joanie Adams
Editorial Profile of Nurma Komala-Hadi
Editorial Profile of The Sturg
Editorial Profile of Surekha Chandrasekhar
Editorial Profile of Fahaz Hameed
Adding and Announcing New Writers
Adding writers, informing them, and responding to their inquiries takes time for our editors. To reduce the administrative workload, we created a short editorial bulletin in curated lists by our editorial accounts like ILLUMINATION, ILLUMINATION-Curators, and ILLUMINATION Amplifiers to introduce new writers joining our publications.
As a practice, we now tag new writers to ensure they are informed about their acceptance through these collections when they join our community. We retain these tags for a few weeks to ensure that new members are aware of their acceptance. This tagging process also benefits new writers by helping them gain more followers
If you are not informed by our curated collections for more than 48 hours after your application and cannot see the pubs in your list, that means that we couldn’t add you to publications, possibly due to missing Medium ID or system glitches, so you need to apply again using our writer registration portal. However, if you provide your email, you will most likely receive an auto invitation to Slack. We respond to writer inquiries on the Slack workspace. When you join, you can ask our chief editor Dr Mehmet Yildiz, to give you access to our pubs.
We accept every ethical writer willing to adhere to Medium’s rules. We don’t reject writer applications unless they are removed due to plagiarism or writing harmful content against Medium’s policies.
New writers need to review the master copy of the onboarding pack before submitting their stories. The most critical point is the photo handling policy attached to the information pack.
We remove publication-related articles and transfer them to the ILLUMINATION Blog pub. So you may check this blog pub when you need information related to our publications.
We created several featured pages for readers. Featured pages show stories to readers interested in specific topics. We continue improving our front page and featured pages to create more visibility for stories to readers. But we also use other tools for visibility.
Update on Stats
Here are our 90-day stats covering reading times, visitors, and views.
Reading times
Reading time performance for 90 days is over 5.1 million minutes.
Views
In the last three months, our stories received over 4.3 million views. This month views increased extra 100K+. We are grateful for this.
The average of unique daily visitors
The average of unique visitors is 37,327 daily. Sometimes we get over 40K unique visitors daily depending on the viral stories. Number of daily visitors increased extra 215 per day.
Followers
We are pleased to see 1038 new followers joined since last month. This is the best stats from last month.
Slack Members
We gained an extra 1000+ members to our Slack workspace.
Writer Registration
Since last month over 1,000 new writers registered in our portal.
We need more volunteer editors.
Our editorial team sometimes gets exhausted. Therefore, we need more volunteer editors as our publications keep growing. Some editors go on vacation, some need a break, or sometimes they get unwell.
If you have time and are interested in supporting our smaller publications as an editor, you may contact our chief editor Dr Mehmet Yildiz on our Slack workspace. The eligibility criteria to serve as an editor for our publications are outlined in this article.
Our Slack group is open to all our contributors. We have 17,354 members on Slack. If you don’t have access to Slack or haven’t received the previous invitation, you can request it via this online web form.
Editors play a vital role in our writers’ success and our readers’ satisfaction. They review your content, publish it on time, and promote published stories to our readers using various methods.
These volunteer editors are also writers. Therefore, they understand the needs of writers. Currently, 135 volunteer editors support our 23K+ writers using the Slack workspace. This is a massive workload for them.
We thought that meeting our editors could be valuable for writers. Therefore, we started an initiative to introduce our editors’ backgrounds and writing styles. We add new editor profiles as our time allows. They usually use the same account on Slack so that you can contact them directly.
Writer Introductions, Featuring, and Interviews
We introduce writers by creating profiles or interviewing them to create visibility for their profiles and content. Recently, Dr. Yildiz interviewed several writers. You can read these exciting interviews from the attached links.
Interview with Dr. Melissa Kalt, MD
An Interview with Yogesh Haribhau Kulkarni (PhD)
An Interview with Author Raymond M.E. Aguirre
An Interview with Hakima TANTRIKA Hakima T A N T R I K A
We also started a new initiative titled “Make invisible stories visible “to increase our contributors’ views and read times. Here are some samples:
Meet Mark Sanford, Ph.D. Mark Sanford, Ph.D.
Meet Psychologist Cedric Johnson, Ph.D. on ILLUMINATION Cedric Johnson, PhD
Chosen Stories from Melinda Blau’s Unique Collection Melinda Blau
Chosen Stories from Sufyan Maan’s Collection Sufyan Maan, M.Eng
We feature our writers’ profiles via the Illumination YouTube channel and blog the transcripts. For example, our volunteer YouTube coordinator Aiden (Illumination Gaming), features writers on our channel. Contact him on our Slack workspace if you want to be featured.
You might find some sample YouTube videos featuring our top writers in this collection titled Meet Top Writers of Medium on YouTube.
Photo Handling Policy — Please Read This Carefully
As our community grows, we’ve encountered a rising concern regarding story images, especially with new writers who may not fully grasp the implications of copyright infringements. We are committed to safeguarding our writers from potential legal issues related to copyright violations on Medium.
To address this, we’ve recently updated our image copyright policy, providing clearer guidelines on the fair use of images. Our primary aim is to ensure that all our writers can confidently create Medium articles without inadvertently breaching copyright rules, which can have serious consequences
Please review our updated policy from this post titled: Why Image Copyrights Matter for Writers and Editors: Update to handling story photos policy for Illumination Integrated Publications on Medium.
We added extra steps to improve image handling as documented in the attached editor bulletin: Not Captioning and Using Copyright Photos Will Lead to Rejection of Stories: If writers, after rejection, continue breaking photo handing rules, we will remove them from our publications. It is their choice. Our editors do their duty of call.
Please check our photo handling policy before submitting your first story to our publication. This will be good for writers and editors.
Here’s How to Handle Story Photos on Medium.
Curating and Amplifying Stories for Visibility
Due to hectic workload our editors couldn’t create new curated collection but last month they did several. We link them here. We change our curation strategy and will share it in an upcoming bulletin.
We curated and distributed thousands of well-written pieces to our readers via blogs and social media. Our repository reached around a million published stories on Illumination and sister publications.
Hand-Picked Articles — 2023 #47: Chosen by the content curators of ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications on Medium for avid readers
ILLUMINATION-Curators also started a new initiative called Reading Club. Here is the latest version.: ILLUMINATION Reading Club #7
ILLUMINATION Amplifiers started to feature book chapters submitted by our published author. Here is the latest version. Hand-Picked Book Chapters #02
Curated Video and Podcast Stories on Medium #3
Curated Stories from Illumination Gaming Publication #2
Last year, we posted 280 collections from the ILLUMINATION Amplifier account. The Illumination team published 138 collections, and ILLUMINATION-Curator posted around 10 collections featuring outstanding stories from experienced writers.
The latest collection from ILLUMINATION: Curated Collection #188
Writing Challenges and Prompts
Several writers completed writing challenges. The 100-Day Writing Challenge is popular. A few writers attempted to 1000 short forms in 100 days too. You can submit one short form to each publication.
Participating in these writing challenges for new MPP contributors might be helpful for progress. You may consider sharing your story links, concerns, and aspirations in this unique challenge. And many readers enjoyed the Challenge called “The Proust Questionnaire.”
These challenges might bring new readers to your stories. We look forward to reading your stories about these challenges. We also feature those who complete challenges in our curated collections, such as hand-picked article series and curated collection posts.
Guidance on Writing Viral Stories
The best way to gain more readers and earn more income on Medium is to create viral stories. It has a significant luck factor, but you might increase the chance with a concerted effort by writing engaging and interesting stories.
Dr Mehmet Yildiz compiled a post with critical items for creating viral stories based on my experience, observations, and reviews of over 100 viral stories in 2021. He is currently analyzing around 100 viral stories in our publications.
We hope some of your stories go viral in 2023. Please keep posting high-quality, informative, and engaging stories on interesting topics. You might ask your friends or family members to review and provide your feedback before submitting your stories. Also, try to find mentors from top writers who can give you guidance and feedback.
Essential Resources for New Writers
We compiled essential guides for new writers in a post titled Starter Kit for Writers of ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications. This collection might be a one-stop shop for new writers to learn more about writing on this platform.
Please also review these guiding policies before submitting their stories. We are tolerant, but the following are non-negotiable rules and Medium’s content hosting and distribution policy.
Zero tolerance to plagiarism on ILLUMINATION
No Defamation, Discrimination, and Hate Speech Published
Why Image Copyrights Matter for Writers and Editors
Publishing and Conduct Guidelines for the Lampshade of ILLUMINATION
Access to archived onboarding packs for new writers
New writers want to connect with previous writers. We provide links to only recent onboarding packs to easily find registered writers, follow them, and explore their content to achieve this goal.
If you need to access old bulletins, you may search for ILLUMINATION, and ILLUMINATION Amplifier accounts for older versions of onboarding packs. Here are a few samples:
Introduction to New Writers, Welcome: New Writers Introduction, Onboarding Pack for New Writers, Welcome New Writers, Welcome New Writers, Onboarding New Writers, Welcome New Writers, Onboarding New Writers, Welcome New Writers, Onboarding New Writers.
Members can follow up to 150 accounts on Medium within 24 hours. New writer accounts are kept for a week in the master copy of the onboarding pack. So, you may check and follow news writers weekly through the onboarding pack.
Summary of Our Publications for New Writers and Readers
1 — ILLUMINATION
ILLUMINATION is followed by 71,000+ readers and visited by around 40,000 unique members daily. As a generic publication, we accept every ethical topic meeting Medium’s guidelines. Link to publication
2 — ILLUMINATION’S MIRROR
This pub is for prolific writers who need to submit multiple stories in a day. If you submit a story to ILLUMINATION, you can submit up to one story to ILLUMINATION’S MIRROR within 24 hours. Link to publication
3 — ILLUMINATION-Curated
This publication is for experienced and accomplished writers. Senior editors select the contributors for this publication using stringent criteria. If you are an experienced writer, we allow you to write for this publication upon your request directly. Link to publication
4 — Technology Hits
We designed this publication for writers and readers interested in technical topics and tech-related stories. You can also submit science fiction in this pub. More info about Technology Hits Value Propositions of Technology Hits. Introduction to Technology Hits. Inviting Storytellers From All Aspects of Technology. Here is a collection including some sample stories from this publication. Link to publication
5 — SYNERGY
This publication serves only freelance writers who want to share writing, blogging, and editing content. It connects writers, editors, and bloggers through their stories. We invite freelance writers from other platforms, such as Vocal Media. Here is the purpose of Synergy. Besides, you may find a sample collection to get an idea of the type of stories we publish on Synergy. Link to publication
6 — ILLUMINATION Book Chapters
This publication is for published and indie authors. We help new writers to get published and become authors. Details about this publication are in this story: ILLUMINATION Book Chapters. More info: How Can Published Authors Create Visibility? Here’s a sample editorial bulletin to promote ILLUMINATION Book Chapters to readers. And here is the Index of Published Book Chapters. You can find some sample book chapters in this collection. Link to publication.
7 — Reader’s Hope
This publication serves absolute beginners. You may submit raw content to this new pub. We don’t edit content submitted to Readers Hope. But, our editors provide valuable and helpful guidance via private notes or in our Slack workspace to members. Here is a story introducing the purpose of Readers Hope. Here is the Vision and Mission of “Readers Hope”. Link to publication
8 — ILLUMINATION Gaming
This new publication aims to bring gamers to one place, inspire them, and create collaboration among gamers. Invitation: Join ILLUMINATION Gaming Publication as a Writer: Your gaming stories have a new home on Medium now. Link to publication
9 — ILLUMINATION Videos and Podcasts
Our new publication is introduced in this article. We changed the name as previously it was only for YouTubers, but we now allow podcasts. You can submit your YouTube videos or podcasts in long or short-form stories. Link to publication
10 — Lampshade of Illumination
If you are looking to diversify your writing portfolio and explore the exciting world of AI-generated content and using AI tools to improve your writing, we have a solution.
Our editorial team has noticed a growing interest among writers in using AI tools to improve their writing and explore its endless possibilities.
However, readers of Illumination Integrated Publications only wanted to read human-generated content. We value and respect their preference for human-generated stories. We analyzed the situation and created a viable solution called the Lampshade of ILLUMINATION.
Please check our AI Policy and submission guidelines for the Lampshade.
AI-Generated Content Policy for ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications on Medium
Publishing and Conduct Guidelines for the Lampshade of ILLUMINATION
ILLUMINATION Blog and Euphoria
We keep all publications-related stories in separate publications called ILLUMINATION’s Blog. This publication can be helpful for new writers to find guiding articles. This publication is not for writers. It is for editorial purposes. Link to publication
Dr Mehmet Yildiz hosts his personal stories in his publication called Euphoria. If you enjoy health and fitness stories, you may check his publication. Link to publication.
Upon request from our readers, we created a new publication which will be announced in an editorial bulletin soon.
Support of Publications Created hasby Writers
Dr. Yildiz helped several writers to create their publications and gain visibility. Publication owners made significant progress in getting loyal readers. Here is a guiding story: Compelling Benefits of Personal Publications on Medium.
ILLUMINATION collected the publications of our contributors in a post titled: Why Writers Need Personal Publications: Invitation to introduce your own publication to the audience of Illumination Integrated Publications.
Diversify Content on Vocal Media, Simily, or NewsBreak
Diversifying content might bring more readers and income to freelance writers. We introduce three options in this post. We keep our writers updated with new writing challenges introduced by Vocal Media. If you are not a writer with Vocal+ yet, you can join at the link in this article.
In addition, repurposing your Medium articles on Vocal may bring additional income to freelance writers. Aiden introduced Vocal recently in a story titled I Finally Joined Vocal+ and Reaped Immediate Benefits.
Aiden introduced a new set of writing contests from Vocal Media.
3 Great Writing Contests on Vocal
Increase the chance of earning a total of $ 1,500 by entering three challenges if you are a prolific writer
We also introduced another writing platform, Simily. What Is Simily and How Can Writers Benefit from This New Writing Platform?
Some of our new writers also contribute to NewsBreak. Our editors informed us that this platform has strict rules and doesn’t allow self-publishing like Medium. If you want to join NewsBreak, you can access the application form via this referral link.
All writers can create referral links on NewsBreak and Vocal, similar to Medium as affiliate links. You can add them to the end of your stories to bring new readers to these platforms with your referral links.
Topic Collections of Stories
We create collections selecting exciting stories from many writers who write on popular topics. Here are some examples compiled by our chief editor.
The Power of Freelancing for Writers
Business Collection: A Mini MBA Bundle
Do You Want to Become an Entrepreneur?
The World Needs Passionate & Compassionate Leaders
Education and Learning From Many Aspects
Featured Stories About “Writing” From The Top Writers of SYNERGY
NFT Story Collection on ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications
How Storytellers Articulate Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain
Top Stories About Artificial Intelligence
Top AI Stories on Technology Hits
Collection of Featured Stories
Stories on ILLUMINATION-Curated — All Volumes
Technology, Business, Leadership, & Self-Improvement Stories
Reading List #3 — Technology Hits
Top 100 Trending Stories: at ILLUMINATION-Curated
Sample Book Chapters: Discover 70+ published authors on ILLUMINATION Book Chapters
Invitation to Potential Writers and Members
To join our vibrant publications, please send a request via this link. We will help you gain visibility and succeed as a writer on Medium. Please mention the publication name with your Medium account ID in the request.
If you are new to Medium, you can join via this link. Readers can read thousands of stories, and writers can monetize self-published content.
You can subscribe to our editorial team to receive newsletters and curated lists. Here is the link https://medium.com/subscribe/@illumination
Thank you for your support and contributions. We look forward to reading, publishing, and promoting your stories.
Writers can directly contact Dr. Yildiz and other editors on the ILLUMINATION Slack workspace when they need help or if their stories get delayed for more than 48 hours.
Invitation to New Writers
Our doors are open to all ethical writers. You can join or leave anytime with no obligation. Our goal is to give you a platform to showcase your stories.
To join our vibrant publications, please send a request via this link.
We will help you gain visibility and succeed as a writer on Medium. Please mention the publication name with your Medium account ID in the request. If you are new to Medium, you can join via this link. Readers can read thousands of stories, and writers can monetize self-published content.
ILLUMINATION Integrated Publications include:
ILLUMINATION, ILLUMINATION-Curated, ILLUMINATION’ S MIRROR, ILLUMINATION Book Chapters, Technology Hits, SYNERGY, Readers Hope, Illumination on YouTube, Illumination Gaming, the Lampshade of Illumination, ILLUMINATION’s Blog, and the personal publication of our chief editor EUPHORIA.
Get an email whenever ILLUMINATION publishes.
Remember, supporting your peers as writers is important for mutual growth. Collaboration and meaningful engagement are key success factors on writing platforms. Here’s some guidance to beginners.
How Peer-to-Peer Recognition Improves Writers’ Lives
Testimonials from peers aren’t just words; they are bridges connecting hearts, minds, and spirits
Our chief editor, Dr Yildiz, wrote many stories guiding new writers. You may find some valuable stories from his writing collection.
Writing, Content Development & Marketing Strategy Guides
Thank you for sharing this newsletter with other writers interested in joining our publications and Slack workspace for collaboration. Our publications are diverse and inclusive.
Thanks , for editing and formatting our newsletter.
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Thank you dear editors for your help to compile this informative newsletter. Many thanks to Aiden for formating and making it more readable and presentable. Welcome new writers.
Thank you for this great update!