I didn't assume you were trying to inflate your stats; I pictured you over there testing a theory.

I've never had anything "go viral" and sometimes I think that's a blessing. It would be nice to earn more than a few pennies (literally!) a month; Medium's recent tweaks have made it hardly worth posting here, rather than on my own website, first.

Unfortunately, that's where many similar sites have failed, in the past, because it leads to speculation and more writing on "why have my earnings fallen" and "how you can game the system to earn $$$$ on [site]" and nobody but the member trying to figure this out wants to read this nonsense.

We should all just focus on writing what really interests us (anything but this) and try to inform or entertain our readers from "out there" - wherever "out there" may be. The public navel gazing has to stop, or the site will implode.