publishing · Medium
You’re creating on Medium, which means…
Of the contracts read for this project, Medium’s is the one that takes least and explains most — the licence is fenced to Medium’s own surfaces and says so. What these Terms never say is what happens to any of it when you leave. And they are not the whole agreement: the Medium Rules, Partner Program Terms, Membership Terms of Service and Username Policy are folded in beside them, and none of those was read here.
What they own
Nothing of yours. “You retain your rights to any content you submit, post or display on or through the Services.” Medium then does something unusual and explains why it needs a licence at all: “Medium needs this license because you own your content and Medium therefore can’t display it across its various surfaces… without your permission.”
What you own
Your rights, kept, and a licence with a fence around it. It’s nonexclusive, so the same story can run anywhere else. And it stops at the edge of Medium: “This license applies to our Services only, and does not grant us any permissions outside of our Services.” The words “perpetual” and “irrevocable” appear nowhere in these Terms.
What you don’t
Anything at all about leaving. The Termination section is two sentences and neither mentions your content, your account, or getting a copy out. There is no survival clause. “Delete” appears once in this document and describes Medium deleting content, not you. “Export” and “subscriber” do not appear in it at all.
What they can do with it
Use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, publicly perform and display it — plus “any name, username or likeness provided in connection with your content”. The licence is sublicensable, and “fully paid,” which is the contract’s way of saying nothing is owed to you for any of the uses in that sentence.
The clauses
The grant
Medium Terms of Service — Rights and Ownership ↗
You retain your rights to any content you submit, post or display on or through the Services.
Unless otherwise agreed in writing, by submitting, posting, or displaying content on or through the Services, you grant Medium a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide, fully paid, and sublicensable license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, publicly perform and display your content and any name, username or likeness provided in connection with your content in all media formats and distribution methods now known or later developed on the Services.
No perpetual, no irrevocable
Neither word is in this document. What limits the licence instead is place: it runs “on the Services,” and the paragraph below says so again.
Sublicensable
Medium can pass these rights on. It is the one modifier here that reaches beyond Medium itself, and the terms don’t say to whom.
Fully paid
Means the licence is already paid for by your using the site. Nothing is owed to you for any use listed in the sentence.
Your name and likeness
Folded into the same sentence as your writing, covering “any name, username or likeness provided in connection with your content”.
The fence around it
Medium Terms of Service — Rights and Ownership ↗
This type of license also is needed to distribute your content across our Services. For example, you post a story on Medium. It is reproduced as versions on both our website and app… A derivative work might be a list of top authors or quotes on Medium that uses portions of your content, again with full attribution. This license applies to our Services only, and does not grant us any permissions outside of our Services.
So long as you comply with these Terms, Medium gives you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, and non-assignable license to access and use our Services.
A stated purpose limit
“applies to our Services only” is the sentence that keeps the licence from travelling. It is what a purpose limit looks like when a platform writes one down.
Which way each grant runs
The first grant is yours to Medium and is sublicensable. This second one is Medium’s to you and is “non-assignable” — you cannot pass it on. Same paragraph, opposite subjects.
They show their work
The worked example — a top-quotes list built from portions of your writing — is Medium describing its own derivative-works right in plain language. Most contracts leave that word undefined.
Distribution is theirs to switch off
Medium Terms of Service — Rights and Ownership ↗
We may stop providing the Services or any of its features within our sole discretion. We also retain the right to create limits on use and storage and may remove or limit content distribution on the Services.
Reach is not a right
Medium can limit how far a post travels without removing it, and the sentence sets no standard and no notice. Read the two halves separately: “within our sole discretion” attaches to the line before it, about stopping the Services; this one carries only “We also retain the right”. If distribution is why you publish here, this is the sentence that governs it.
Storage limits too
The same line reserves the right to cap use and storage, on an account you may have been building for years.
Leaving
Medium Terms of Service — Termination ↗
You’re free to stop using our Services at any time. We reserve the right to suspend or terminate your access to the Services with or without notice.
That is the whole section
Two sentences. Nothing about deleting your account, nothing about what happens to your posts, nothing about taking a copy with you.
Nothing said about the licence
These Terms contain no survival clause and no statement that the licence ends. What becomes of it when you stop using Medium is not addressed in this document.
With or without notice
Suspension or termination of your access needs no warning and no cause stated.
Other users’ data is your obligation
Medium Terms of Service — Your Account and Responsibilities ↗
If you use the Services to access, collect, or use personal information about other Medium users (“Personal Information”), you agree to do so in compliance with applicable laws. You further agree not to sell any Personal Information, where the term “sell” has the meaning given to it under applicable laws.
The duty runs to you
This is not a permission Medium takes — it is a rule you agree to keep. If you use the Services to collect personal information about other Medium users, compliance is yours, and you agree “not to sell any Personal Information”.
You warrant the consents
The next paragraph makes you represent that you “lawfully collected” any Personal Information you hand Medium and that all required notices and consents were given first.
No audience language anywhere
The people on the platform are described only as “other Medium users”. The words “subscriber”, “reader” and “audience” do not appear in this document at all — it has nothing to say about a following as something you hold.
This is not the whole agreement
Medium Terms of Service — Miscellaneous; Other Terms and Policies that May Apply to You ↗
These Terms, and the terms and policies listed in the Other Terms and Policies that May Apply to You Section, reflect the entire agreement between the parties relating to the subject matter hereof and supersede all prior agreements, statements and understandings of the parties.
…
Other Terms and Policies that May Apply to You
- Medium Rules
- Partner Program Terms
- Membership Terms of Service
- Username Policy
- Amendment to Medium Terms of Service Applicable to U.S. Government Users
Five documents, one agreement
The entire-agreement sentence does not stop at these Terms. It reaches “the terms and policies listed in the Other Terms and Policies that May Apply to You Section”, and that section lists five. They bind you whether or not you opened them.
Which of them were read
Only these Terms. The Medium Rules, the Partner Program Terms, the Membership Terms of Service, the Username Policy and the U.S. government amendment were not read for this entry — so every absence reported above is an absence in this document, not in the agreement as a whole.
Nothing outside counts
The same sentence supersedes “all prior agreements, statements and understandings of the parties”. Anything Medium told you outside these documents is not part of what you signed.
Due Dilly reads the paperwork and reports what it says. This is not legal advice.