Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn • Hacker News Board

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#371

Post by adrianmonk » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 4:38 PM UTC

lordnacho wrote: post #15

I find that a lot of serendipitous connections are made on LinkedIn. People will see my profile and strike up a conversation. Seems to work OK for what it is. What it isn't great for is content. There's never anything remotely useful there, the whole feed is a weird corporate version of the self help section in a bookshop. A lot of stuff is written purely to get attention. But I also don't see the tradeoff in as poor…

The fact that it even supports all that content is kind of silly. I don't think it was ever reasonable to expect it to actually be useful.

I would guess the reason it exists at all is that someone at LinkedIn figured out that, by its very nature, their site does not generate regular or frequent user engagement. What need is there to visit the site except to update your information occasionally or at select times when you want to make a change to your job situation?

But if you're LinkedIn, you don't want to run a site that people visit every now and then. You want users coming back all the time. More 30-day active users is better, right? So you try to create an artificial reason for them to do that. And it must be job-related, because that's what your site is about. So random user-generated job tips it is.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#372

Post by TrinaryWorksToo » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 4:42 PM UTC

SamuelAdams wrote: post #159

hliyan wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counter-example to the original author: I refused to have a LinkedIn account for the first 12 years of my career (LinkedIn launched the same year I started my career, I believe). But after I opened one, it really helped my career. I found my last two jobs through it. My timeline looks OK because I unfollow a lot of people. I've done the same with Facebook. I rarely come away from either site with my blood pressure an…

> I unfollow a lot of people This is the trick to turning platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn into a tool, not a vice. You need to curate who you follow. Facebook in particular has many tools to do this, from preventing their content posting to your news feed to unfriending them altogether. Too many people just follow everyone they know, then complain when they start seeing content that gives them negative outcomes.…

I wish social networks would not automatically follow people when I connect with people.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#373

Post by ChrisMarshallNY » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 4:44 PM UTC

ThePhysicist wrote: post #28

From a professional standpoint LinkedIn gave me a lot of value for free so I'm mostly feeling positive about it, but I agree that like any social network it has downsides and can lead to psychological stress. Personally I live by the mantra that "scrolling is dangerous", i.e. I try to never interact with social media or news platforms that incite me to scroll down a feed of algorithmically curated news or updates, as…

> Personally I live by the mantra that "scrolling is dangerous"

I like that way of looking at it.

I have to agree. I no longer even load the FB timeline. I have to have an FB account in order to interact with the community for one of my open-source projects, but I check it maybe once a day.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#374

Post by asurty » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 4:48 PM UTC

42_ wrote: post #97

ThePhysicist wrote: post #28

From a professional standpoint LinkedIn gave me a lot of value for free so I'm mostly feeling positive about it, but I agree that like any social network it has downsides and can lead to psychological stress. Personally I live by the mantra that "scrolling is dangerous", i.e. I try to never interact with social media or news platforms that incite me to scroll down a feed of algorithmically curated news or updates, as…

Now that I think about it, most of my complaints about LinkedIn is about the "news feed". Its full of mostly useless content by wannabe thought leaders drowning out a few posts which may have been insightful/relevant. Job search and add/message connections are the only features I have found useful.

I've been using it more to read Dalio's articles. Which makes me curious why he is using linked in and not just hire someone to set up a personal blog for him ( ? )

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#375

Post by staycoolboy » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 4:51 PM UTC

ssijak wrote: post #308

mancerayder wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> wannabe thought leaders A high percentage of which seem to be recruiters cutting and pasting words of wisdom, inspirational quotes that dozens of people "Like." I don't know how people can take this stuff seriously.

Or people pasting gotcha dumb math “problems” where hundreds of people reply the answer. I could never understand that.

Did you read the comments from the guy that left facebook? It was like reading YouTube comments. People were flaming him from their professional accounts.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#376

Post by dep_b » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:01 PM UTC

I have a LinkedIn account for quite a few years now after some initial hesitation and the bad feeling never quite went away given the fact they still scrape address books and other dark patterns.

I used to leave it on "not interested in new work" because I already got so much spam, but then I flipped the switch in March because I temporarily lost all of my customers at once due to Coronascare and I had to scramble for new work.

Most leads that I get that I wouldn't get before are pretty high quality I have to say. I do see that once a new job lands that matches my profile multiple recruiters reach out on the same day for the same job and I see the same opening repeated several times over.

I don't understand why the job market needs to be so opaque.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#377

Post by the_af » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:02 PM UTC

rileyt wrote: post #320

the_af wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that it -- at least my feed -- is not true positivity, it's fake positivity, which brings a strong negative reaction in me. Gurus talking entrepreneur-, startup- or hiring- bullshit, recruiters extolling the virtues of their profession, "if you're having a bad time with COVID19, here's something to stay positive" [bullshit follows]. LinkedIn is useful as an online resume. But the feed is mostly garbage…

You should check out https://standardresume.co . It's a minimalist web resume builder that lets you start by importing your LinkedIn profile. No feed, no recruiter spam and we don't sell your personal data like LinkedIn does.

Thanks! Will check it out.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#378

Post by non-entity » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:05 PM UTC

antonyh wrote: post #168

42_ wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now that I think about it, most of my complaints about LinkedIn is about the "news feed". Its full of mostly useless content by wannabe thought leaders drowning out a few posts which may have been insightful/relevant. Job search and add/message connections are the only features I have found useful.

Of late (this year) in my experience the job section is mostly reposts of other jobs or positions already filled or fake roles. Any post by a company with no logo is virtually guaranteed to be spam. I'm seeing them side-by-side with the real post. It's highly polluted by these bad actors.

I agree, it's not uncommon to see pages of the same listing by a dozen different recruiting companie, many with no logo.

The worst part though, to me, is that it seems too often to completely ignore my search terms in favor of showing me "sponsored" or jobs that match my profile, even if they completely lack anything from my search.

It's a shame, because it has a few features I really like that I dont see in other job boards. The ability to filter by both the company industry and the job function is pretty nice.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#379

Post by quadrifoliate » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:08 PM UTC

searchableguy wrote: post #344

allanbreyes wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use uBlock Origin to completely block out the news feed and messaging, and it makes my LinkedIn experience orders of magnitude better. When I visit linkedin.com, now, I'm greeted with a navigation header bar and a blank page where the news feed used to be. It's perfect. I personally found messaging to not be very useful or relevant, and I just couldn't keep up with the backlog of messages. If they really want to co…

Reading the comments here. I find it scary that people are willing to deal with broken "tools" to such an extent and manipulate their own behavior to fit profit-seeking companies. I can see why we will be stuck with the same few social media and recruiting platforms because people are not willing to change but they are willing to put in the effort.

Are you are involved with recruiting in any way? Then be the change you want to see in the world. Does the company you work for use LinkedIn or use recruiters that send messages of LinkedIn? Make an effort to stop hiring them, and use neutral tools like email.

I dislike LinkedIn, but have seen very few people walk the walk professionally when it comes to influencing their own workplace to stop using it in some way. I have advised every company I have worked at against using external recruiters, and rarely has it been accepted (even though we always got a lot of candidates from the external recruiters who weren't a good fit with regards to either skills or eagerness).

Props to the article author for actually doing so, and I hope they will remember this and not use LinkedIn when the company they are cofounding has to recruit their N > 20th employee.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#380

Post by three_seagrass » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:12 PM UTC

sk0v wrote: post #63

I really consider getting rid of my car. I bought it a year ago, but it's only ever sat in the driveway, I never use it. The funny meta-thing about his post, is that the content he feels adds 0 value, is in fact his own post. He is literally making a post about a tool he doesn't use. It's the equivalent of a person making a blog post about a tv series they don't watch but have seen the trailer for; no actual value to…

You don't need your car until you need your car - i.e. you aren't driving to pick up groceries 16 hours a day. That doesn't make your car valueless.

Likewise, Linkedin isn't needed the majority of the time, until you need it - i.e. you're faced with having to find a new job in an industry where the right referral can translate directly into a job with higher income.

That's not valueless.