They probably are quite similar. I never paid for anything on Medium though and usually clicked away as soon as they showed me their forced sign up page. It's

They probably are quite similar. I never paid for anything on Medium though and usually clicked away as soon as they showed me their forced sign up page. It's not exactly the platform which I like here (Substack). It's the content by the people I subscribe to which I like. If they moved to another paid platform in future, I would follow them. Last year I stopped following corporate media and decided to put my money where I really wanted to support, so I went with the substacks of these independent journalists/commentators I value. When Glenn Greenwald resigned from The Intercept, that was what finally got me to start paying for people I wanted to support.