Is “members-only” something writers can opt in to? That’s the impression I’m getting on this, but it’s difficult to find definite confirmation, though I finally find what I think is confirmation in the “Become a member to unlock a new layer of Medium:” section of https://medium.com/membership.

Alas, this evasive approach to disclosing precise information seems so often to be the case once money is involved; just yesterday I had to delve deep (as far as the T&Cs) to confirm that Zoos Victoria’s advertised “$9/month” membership actually means “$108/year, but you can pay in monthly instalments if you like”.

Kind of shady, I don't think I will write on this platform anymore.

What's shady about asking people to pay for content? It seems like it's pretty much out in the open so you can take it or leave it, not secret or covert or shady in any way.

It's shady if they're not giving out royalties to the writers. Not sure if they do

They do. See [1], heading "REWARD YOUR FAVORITE AUTHORS"

[1]: https://medium.com/membership

They are. But, I’m having a hard time figuring out what percentage of the revenue.

Nothing is wrong with paying writers. But I do have a problem with the Medium bait-and-switch. They offered a great interface for writing and publishing content that is free, and then years later start charging for access to that content after millions of people have published articles.

Did you think that it would remain completely free (and ad-free, which was its major selling point) forever? I actually quite like what they're trying to do with their new business model.

I haven't heard about it until now. I don't want people to have to pay to read me.