Time to Change Writing/Publishing/Marketing Tactics
After seven years on Medium, I am still a bottom writer.
The fault lies with my main topic: Tiered Democratic Governance (TDG). I want the world to build a new democracy because the current democracies are not working out that well. I have developed the blueprint, and the project needs to move from the drafting board to the construction site. In other words, we need “early TDG builders.”
I estimate I have engaged with 10,000 Medium people about the TDG. If 0.1% of them had taken on the role of early TDG builder, the TDG would be in a much better position today. Alas, the committed TDGers constitute zero percent of my rather large focus group.
It’s not hard to understand why. Systems of governance are difficult to change. When such changes happen, the reason is a collapse of the current system. Then influential people rush in to give their “expertise,” and a new system is created. They showed up for the good example of Czechoslovakia moving from communism to a multi-party democracy. The same kind of transition did not work well for Yugoslavia and Iraq.
And the common people who overthrew the old system have little to do with designing the new system. And the new system needs to be put in fairly quickly.
The TDG approach, where the people deliberately build the new system before the current system collapses, does not have a historical parallel. My audience cannot envision this kind of change. They cannot imagine them playing a role in this change.
TDG Caveats
Many Medium contributors are using Medium to promote their books. Because I am also selling books, it’s reasonable not to play into my alternative motive. But I have also put my books for a free read from my website. In this way, neither money nor technology is an impediment to learn about the TDG.
Throughout my writing, I have stated that each TDG builder need only spend 10 hours a month to start the TDG off. Most political watchers are spending more time watching politics. Most political activists spend more time organizing. Most political theorists spend more time pontificating. Most political players are spending much more time in the back rooms making political deals. Paradoxically, the TDG has the potential for the greatest political change for the least effort.
And throughout my writing, I have stated that we, the people, need to learn some new humanistic skills to make the TDG work. Simply stated, we will move from conflict, contention, and contempt to collaboration, consultation, and consensus. We already have some of these latter skills; the building of the TDG will make these skills dominate in TDG governance. Make sure you understand that the early TDG builders will — consciously and deliberately — be building a new political culture.
In the end, the TDG will not succeed because of my rhetoric. Rather it will succeed by the good example of the early TDG builders and their successors. When 1% of a nation’s population join their local TDG, my involvement will no longer be necessary.
The TDG Rewrite
My marketing strategy for the last year and a half has had two main tentacles. First, I have been writing one Medium article a week. Second, I have been making about eight posts a day on Mastodon (a twitter clone but with organic ownership). These posts have short text, eye-catching graphics, and links leading to an article on the TDG Blog. For a while, the TDG website was getting about 50 weekly visitors. But since April, visitor count has diminished to only five.
I am also on LinkedIn and Substack, but engagement is next to zero.
The TDG website has somehow acquired 200 subscribers. I have sent out newsletters, but there has been no tangible engagement.
Last spring I set up TDG-Zoom meetings and promoted them on all my forums. After 12 meetings, only one person showed up.
I would continue with this Medium/Mastodon/Zoom marketing. A lucky break is always possible if I keep posting. The TDG is a unique topic and needs only one celebrity endorsement to break the ice.
But for about a year, I have been thinking about the new “moving TDG pieces” I have uncovered. While these pieces are scattered throughout the TDG Blog, they should be gathered into the TDG book, which was written nine years ago. The failure of the Zoom meetings was the sign to suspend the marketing and work on the rewrite.
Many of these new moving pieces have been directly or indirectly inspired by Medium. Had I not hung around Medium for longer than I should have (when my focus group told me: “No way, Dave”), these new perspectives would not have come to me. In this sense, Medium has served a great purpose.
TDG Acknowledgements
In the past seven years, I have been both entertained and educated by many Medium writers, too many to mention. You kept me here for me to find my next purpose.
I acquired about 150 lukewarm TDG fans. Your reads, claps, and comments tickled the algorithms, so more people took a look at the TDG. I am not in the bottom of the bottom writer category.
Many of these fans are no longer active on Medium. Others have lost interest in the TDG. But here are a few active fans: Jim Fonseca, Anaya, Author, D. Dinese Dianaty, Caladan, Bill Hepler, John Kilbane, John Turley, Scott Christenson, Pat O'Leary, Benjamin David Steele, and Sofia K.
Thanks for the pub owners who posted many of my articles: Scott Tarlo, Melanie J, John Polonis, and Colby Hess. The pub Dialogue & Discourse also presented some of my work, but I’m not sure who the editors are. I hope the new changes in Medium are rewarding your extra efforts.
I found a couple innovative thinkers. Frederick Bott has a hydrogen economy model. Stephen Yearwood has a new economic distribution model. While I’m not in agreement (yet), I admire how you have put your many pieces together. We overthinkers are not as crazy as the people around us think we are.
Then there are the political innovators. Allan Milne Lees, Tony Bracks, and Julian S. Taylor are looking beyond western democracy.
Special thanks to these Medium contributors who engaged with the TDG with lengthy discussion: Chris Crawford, Luke Macmicael, Martin Rezny, Sam Young, Paolo Calvi, Kevin Pauley, and Victor Babanyi. Your fingerprints will be on the fifth edition of Tiered Democratic Governance.
I should also mention the various Russia/Ukraine writers who I follow: Dylan Combellick, Nadin Brzezinski, Chris Snow, B Kean, Giorgio Provincialy and, recently, Elvira Bary and Oleh Cheslavskyi. While your reports of the war are valuable, I am still amazed at how you have independently, individually, and unitedly laid out the nature of the Russian culture. Simply stated, the Russian culture does not have much internal integrity. Advancement depends on using people ruthlessly. Survival depends on not challenging the system. The Russians on the low end of this culture have no real political or legal power. Neither do the conquered ethnic groups within Russia. This deliberate sense of powerlessness has been going on for centuries.
Yet there is connection between the Russian culture and the TDG. The Ukrainian people have consciously and deliberately rejected their history. For that, they are paying a much higher price than what the TDG calls for. So many Medium people have told me it is impossible to change any political culture so it is pointless putting in that 10 hours a month. The Ukrainians have proven them wrong.
Finally, I shall mention the Medium people who have understood how the TDG is to move forward. They use whatever social media connections they have to tell the world of a new possible way. When other people see other people promoting the TDG, more minds are changed. In seven years, Francesco Rizzuto has written about 25 TDG articles on Medium and Substack.
The TDG Marketing
I can’t do the TDG rewrite and the TDG promotion at the same time. The marketing will be distraction for serious writing.
LinkedIn and Substack will be totally ignored in this time. So will my subscriber list.
I shut down my Mastodon marketing a month ago. I’ll probably run through the TDG Blog again through Mastodon in January — just to see if my posts can generate some interest again.
I can see putting up 10 Medium articles in 2027, just to see what happens.
I estimate the rewrite will take two years.
What marketing happens when the rewrite is finished? Well, I cannot say.
The Psychology of My 1%
In my opinion, the third (2009) and fourth (2017) editions of the Tiered Democratic Governance book were sufficient to move the TDG forward. While the fifth edition will be an improvement, it will not be strong enough to overcome the resistance I am currently experiencing. For more than a few reasons, the public remains overwhelming convinced that western democracy is the only “good” way to govern — and it can be repaired.
So it seems things need to get worse for people to take notice of my new way. I predict 2030 is when this “worse” could happen. The Democrats are likely to handily win the Presidency and Congress in 2028. Then Americans can watch this political party not do very much, following the same path of the last Democratic administration. Then maybe when this happens, the astute 1% will finally realize how broken the system is — and their new political role is with the TDG.
Or maybe the Republicans will find their oligarchy. The TDG can still be built under these political conditions. The agitators will be cover for the TDG builders.
Either way, the fifth edition should be ready before 2030. Coupled with the change in the psyche of my 1%, the fifth edition might have the edge to convince them to put in that 10 hours a month to build a new democracy.
And that 1% will grow to 10%. Then 40%. Then 75%. All great social/political movements start small.
Conclusion
I have already started working on the fifth edition.
Be rest assured that the current TDG website has everything you need to start moving the TDG forward.
Maybe bookmark the TDG website in case you change your mind.
Then I will be mostly dark on the internet for about two years.
Published on Medium 2026
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