Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn • Hacker News Board

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#391

Post by wolco » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:30 PM UTC

stevage wrote: post #206

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…

I find this fascinating, as my experience is the opposite. I have hundreds of connections, mostly people I've met throughout my career. And yet, it has never actually delivered anything of value to me. A few potential freelancing gigs which didn't pan out. A lot of random encounters from people I would never want to work with. By contrast, StackOverflow and Twitter have given me some really great work opportunities.

Is there a good way to search twitter for jobs?

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#392

Post by jasonv » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:30 PM UTC

GaryNumanVevo wrote: post #369

jasonv wrote: post #348

I deleted LinkedIn about 5 years ago when I went totally independent. I was super happy not to have it. I recently re-created it because a consulting engagement put me back in the center of "Are you on LinkedIn?" discussions. I do look forward to closing my account again. There's a lot of "professional posting" that goes on -- professional signaling, and uplifting daily posts. Knowing the people who are posting these…

There's nothing forcing you to scroll the feed. I just uBlock the entire feed, and use it as an online Rolodex. I've also built a fairly sizeable contact book of headhunters, should I ever want to leave my current position.

True. And worth considering.

But it's not like I'm challenged by a corner case of their product offer. It's the whole creamy middle. I'm inclined to want out.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#393

Post by apple4ever » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:32 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 noticed that too when I was looking for a job. I've learned to tell which is a real company and which is a scammy recruiter.

Also, I can't stand the interface for looking for a job. I really wish it had a "Jobs since you last looked", because otherwise I just kept seeing the same jobs I wasn't interested in.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#394

Post by FlaSheridn » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:36 PM UTC

jiofih wrote: post #316

game_the0ry wrote: post #310

This blog post comes off whiny and weak, with a tone of unearned moral and social superiority, all while making sweeping generalizations and false claims. The author used LI poorly, then complained publicly about being dissatisfied. I get that randoms invites and messages are annoying, but the inconvenience shouldn't outweigh the benefit from LI replacing resumes for professional branding.[1] The 1 page resume is an…

I just got a job using my one-page resume. It looks almost the same as my LinkedIn profile. What’s the difference?

Your LinkedIn profile is public, and your contacts might notice if you padded it conspicuously. Even more important, it’s _one_ thing, whereas a targeted résumé is what the target wants to hear.

When reviewing résumés for a software quality assurance position in a trendy sector, I saw numerous résumés from people with no apparent desire to do software quality assurance, but plenty of desire to move into the trendy sector. One was from a senior manager, who had sometimes supervised departments that included lots of stuff, including QA. His targeted résumé differed from his public profile basically by appending “& QA” in several places. After that, I largely ignored targeted résumés.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#395

Post by fakedang » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:36 PM UTC

outime wrote: post #64

kuu wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I would say HN seems interesting in most cases, not only some attention grabbing platform. Don't you agree?

I get what you mean but I didn't say that attention-grabbing platforms are incompatible with (at least some) interesting content. Also, HN doesn't have many dark patterns (or any?) and I'd not consider it a typical social network like FB, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc but more like a forum. But even if we consider this place a social network, comparing it to any of the typical social networks is futile IMHO.

The difference between HN and any other social platform can be summarized in one word - dang.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#396

Post by wolco » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:38 PM UTC

coldpie wrote: post #155

Nextgrid wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wonder how the positive and respectful space here may be reproduced in other social media platforms. It's very simple once you stop chasing growth and engagement metrics. The main reasons the other social media platforms are cesspools is because outrage generates engagement so the platform is designed to encourage it as well as encouraging users to join and stay regardless of the quality of their contributions, w…

Strongly agreed. 95% of the web's problems can be blamed squarely on advertising-based business models. HN does not have ads, so the focus is not on getting more users and clicks (i.e. generating outrage), and the excellent moderators are quick to punish harmful users, because there is no motivation to keep them around.

HN is an ad. You are part of that ad model.

It doesn't show you ads because it is not trying to sell you anything. You could make a point that the hiring posts for ycombinator grads are ads.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#397

Post by the_af » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:42 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.

"83% of people won't be able to solve this" (some basic puzzle follows).

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#398

Post by tomrod » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:44 PM UTC

rileyt wrote: post #324

tomrod wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've found good recruiting agencies through LI, and a whole lot of spammy ones. The good ones I consider worth my time and are basically the only value I see from interacting with LI. Seeing people's resume is a nice side benefit, but something like VisualCV or similar offer a better format. As a social network? Nah, I'm old school -- the dark closets/water coolers of the interwebs shouldn't be in the same place as p…

If you like VisualCV, you should check out https://standardresume.co . You can import your LinkedIn profile and our resume templates are designed in collaboration with hiring managers at top tech companies.

Why do hiring managers input into the design? Would it not be more efficient to have in-house recruiters provide their keyword scan values?

Having been a hiring manager in that space, I'm not convinced the format mattered more than avoiding the obvious overly inscrutable wall of text, grammar check failures, or irrelevant data points.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#399

Post by bofadeez » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:49 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…

Ad-based media is not free. It changes you on a subconscious level and manufactures demand in your mind. And if you're using an ad blocker, you're stealing from them.

Re: Finally, I Closed My LinkedIn

#400

Post by cactus2093 » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:51 PM UTC

NotSammyHagar wrote: post #388

He says people switch jobs around the 2 years time frame, which is surprising and short. Is that true, an avg say in tech? I have been doing that but I didn't realize it was that common. In SF I've heard staying a year is the goal to get stock, then after that look for the next thing.

Well there's not one single "the goal" that everyone follows. Some people are genuinely happy to be working for a company they really believe in, some people are looking for experience to level up their career/rise up the corporate ladder/start their own company in the future.

If you're just looking for a payout, going to a bunch of startups for 1 year and then moving on and collecting equity from all of them is an interesting approach. It potentially improves your odds of a > 0 payout compared to going all in on one startup and staying in one place for many years. But I suspect if you're optimizing for a combination of expected value + downside risk, you really can't do better than FAANG or a large unicorn. I suspect a very, very small number of people who have worked at any combination of various startups for the past 5 years will have outperformed someone who worked at Google that whole time. And that's before even taking into account the time value/liquidity of the public stock - even if some of the startups over that time period do go on to be successful, you might have to wait 5+ years after you leave to cash it out.