Interesting idea. But impossible to implement in practice. A lot of pubs will schedule articles days/weeks in advance. So the writer often does not have total control over their publishing schedule. eg. Might have 10 come out one week, and 3 the next.

I do, however, think you're onto something re the "lot of crap is published on Medium daily." Some writers publish three sentences and call it an article. Also see lots of blatant ads for companies. Spam like that needs to be regulated better. So perhaps deprioritizing 1-2 minute articles in the newsfeed would work more efficiently/easier to implement than an outright ban.