Personally, the reason I don't go directly to medium for news is I think their content is all over the place. Some articles are about life lessons, some are about programming, some about startups, etc... If I'm reading the news, I tend to look for a given theme at any given time. If I'm working, I'm looking to read about programming stuff. If I'm watching TV and I have a laptop in front of me, I may want to read about current events Going to HN or gizmodo or ... usually presents me with a specific topic. Medium (IMO) does not.