POST 1: THE LIFECYCLE OF THE SUN

ANALYSIS OF ENGAGEMENT

The Medium post on the lifecycle of the sun was our group's first time posting on Medium, and we were not too sure what to expect in terms of engagement. After tracking the engagement metrics daily for a week, we found that the number of views on the platform was decent relative to the other platforms. Over the first three days, views steadily increased from 8 to 11 to 17, b efore reaching a total of 19 views on day 7. However, there was only one clap/applaud (the platform's equivalent of likes), from an astronomer with whom we shared the post. That is, there were no "organically" obtained claps. There were also no comments, which may be a result of Medium being more a platform for long-form blog-style writing. This particular topic and delivery were somewhat well suited to the platform as it gives a high-level overview of the complicated physical processes that go on, while attempting to make connections to daily life (e.g., by comparing the energy output of the Sun to the world's energy usage; Ritchie et. al, 2020) to be more relatable to people who are less familiar with physics.

POST 2: THE SCIENCE OF ANT-MAN

ANALYSIS OF ENGAGEMENT

Our second post on Medium, titled "The Science(-Fiction) of Ant-Man", attracted very little engagement. There were no claps or comments. There was one view on the first day, and a second view on the seventh day. In total, those two views were the only forms of engagement across the entire week. A possible explanation for the poor performance of this post is that the topic is not particularly well suited for the target audience of Medium. Whereas users of Medium tend to be older (relative to users of other platforms like TikTok) and more interested in serious topics like entrepreneurship, technology, and politics, the topic and title seem to be aimed more at young people who are interested in Marvel movies and fiction. This is supported by research from the digital marketing agency MADX (MADX, 2021). In comparison, the previous post on the lifecycle of the Sun is rooted in hard science, which may be more appealing to the audience of Medium.

POST 3: WHY THINGS NEVER ACTUALLY TOUCH

ANALYSIS OF ENGAGEMENT

Our final Medium post, "Why things never really touch", attracted very little engagement. There were no claps or comments. There were a total of 7 views at the end of 7 days; a good portion of the views came on the first day, and then more views trickled in over time. For this post, we had 4 views on the first day, with the other 3 views coming in on days 4, 5, and 7. The low amount of interaction with the post can likely be attributed to a combination of factors, like not having already built up a large following and/or the topic not being appealing for the general audience of Medium. The catchy title appears to have helped somewhat, attracting more engagement than the straightforward title of the previous post. It is also clear that the topic itself has the potential to be interesting, as a Vsauce video with a similar title and topic has attracted over 6 million views, and so we can conclude that it is likely our execution (writing, platform, etc.) that was poor (Vsauce, 2011).