Anything that helps surface first-time authors - whether self-published or traditional/hybrid.

My publisher has a sales staff for marketing my first novel to bookstores, but that's about it. And of course, they do all the printing.

But marketing is up to me. I don't have the budget or the social network to go very far with that. I write a lot of stories here on Medium, but it won't be enough, I don't think, to help much.

Amazon's algorithms heavily favor established authors. Most other algorithms do, too.

You can make the argument that a lot of self-published eBooks are bad, but many are good.

Maybe you could consider a Medium feature or app that EXCLUSIVELY features new authors and an opportunity for people to review their books in a sane way that doesn't allow for abuse or finagling the system.