Tony Stubblebine actually does engage.

Not with everyone. But in my Medium reading, I've often enjoyed his responses to a variety of writers, many of them with only a few followers.

I even wrote an essay about this once.

https://medium.com/ask-an-editor/coach-tony-reads-every-word-you-write-cd6610c4bce?sk=15d598676b8322a2fb9cab88487e8e2f

That being said, there are plenty of successful Medium writers who almost never read the work of other Medium writers. They've decided that its more productive to spend the time writing than spend the time reading.

I don't follow most of those folks either.