The reason why people read the doom and gloom articles is because people are drawn to sensationalism (if it bleeds, it leads), and because people like to bolster their sense of pride by pointing out bad things that they don't feel responsible for.

This is actually not as much as Umair and Jessica having won the "Medium lottery" so much as them tapping into a well known human phenomenon.

And the thing is, Medium is actually kind of powerless to change this. If Medium stopped promoting the gloom and doom stories, people would likely start reading other platforms besides Medium.