✅ Thanks, Judy, I wondered about this as well. In the SEO world, full read time matters.

Medium knows how to save dollars paid out.

Because they know human nature. 30 seconds only

Similar to the audio— who can ever listen to that fast-paced version?

However, the shorter the read time, the less money is paid out to the writer.

ADD, if your story is 4 minutes and AUDIO comes in at 3 minutes, that is a downgrade for SEO points.

All of this affects earnings.