The Existential Terror of LinkedIn | Hacker News Reader

The Existential Terror of LinkedIn

shkspr.mobi

30 pointsedent13 comments

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LinkedIn is a job board. It's actually a very good job board, I use it tons to search for jobs or candidates.

I don't understand why people try to treat it like a social network, just don't and it works like a charm.

100% agree. I also wanted to add that:

> I know the obvious thing is to stop visiting LinkedIn

There is a maybe less obvious strategy, that is yet very simple and effective: unfollow everybody.

I maintain my LinkedIn just for when I want to start looking around, otherwise I never log in or think about it.

Heh, a friend of mine who did a lot of talks used to ask the audience to put their hands up if they'd used LinkedIn recently. He'd then quip "How's the job search going?".

i believe businesses treat it as a social network, and the people are forced to grin with it.

theres a couple of businesses i subscribe to where its obviouw theyre forced to hype their new positions.

This is an extremely bitter outlook on life. When coworkers land jobs at places I've bombed interviews at, I'm genuinely happy for them!

Come on now, there's a bit of tongue-in-cheek in the piece and it's funny!

someone didn't read it through the last sentence ;-)

The keepin-up-with-the-jones’ aspect of LinkedIn only feeds those admiring big tech. I’ve been in startups for five years but recently posted about accepting an offer at popular company and it got picked up by LinkedIn’s algo and promoted to thousands of people (based on # of views).

Strangely, after posting it, other companies like Google reached out AFTER I accepted the offer, as if LinkedIn bumped me up on some social rating system.

The author's problem is not LinkedIn.

Sounds like how I imagine Facebook is, some reheated Hell where you get to see how great things are for your ex- every day.

I always thought that linkedin was a way to discover when companies are doing poorly -- and there might be enough signal to allow you to trade profitably on the stock market. Even if not, there probably is a good enough story to be woven around it that you might get some VC funding to pursue it!

If other people succeeding causes you discomfort the problem is not with them or the medium where they advertise their success. The problem is with you.

I suggest to chill out and be stoic about it.

It is unlikely there is only one way you could have reached happiness in your life and that you just missed it.

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