Oh yes! - I feel your pain. Medium only pays for internal reads, but it's also based on the minutes; ie, every minute of reading counts.

Obviously, the longer, the better.

Having said that, long reads tend to get scrolled off before the reader finishes so you don't get the financial reward for it.

The only great thing about curation is exposure: the more followers you have, the more reads you get.

Welcome to Medium BTW!