Yes, and here is why.
- Social media challenges your self of self-worth. I spoke more about it yesterday but when we constantly compare ourselves to others we are going to feel inadequate or unhelpfully superior. We are unique and if others are better/worse it has no bearing on our worth.
- There is a false sense of community. I would like to believe that people do things out of the goodness of their hearts, but too often what we see is cynical and manipulative. Instead of being authentic LinkedIn is filled with false stories and ridiculous fronting. The salesmanship on LinkedIn is ridiculous. Everyone is an expert, and very few admit their mistakes and real faults. LinkedIn isn’t a guide for anything other than corporate speak and lies.
- Atrocious writing and formatting. The writing on LinkedIn is so basic and derivative. It devolves from common English to half slang, half haiku. Writing isn’t clear because it is one sentence per paragraph. It is clear when it is one thought per paragraph. If adults with college educations can’t talk with more nuance than elementary students, what is the future of the country?
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LinkedIn prison Invasion of spammers means networks are untrustworthy. LinkedIn help has never acted on when I have given them evidence of spammers here. I work hard to keep spammers out of my network, but people connect to others who have nothing on their profiles and have no reason to believe they are real. They try to connect with me. Not even. We all are responsible for not accepting dodgy connections.
- Companies will try to trick you. I have had multiple times companies that I applied to on LinkedIn directly try to con me. Some even dare to demand your Social Security number to complete your application. When your personal information isn’t protected, it only helps criminals. Besides this, companies say they are remote but only reveal they expect a hybrid or on-site schedule until you are deep in the application process.
- Wear you out with stupidity. LinkedIn tries to wear you out with stupidity. Their LinkedIn learning videos are mostly trash and I have watched thousands of them. Very few are worth the time it takes to watch them. Most of them are just an advertisement for the person or company. I don’t mind infomercials when they are labeled as that and free. I stopped my premium subscription because I am not paying to watch infomercials.
- The most popular people on LinkedIn pander to their audiences. Being popular is simple. You just need to tell people what they want to hear and what makes them feel good. They are popular, and vacuous and make everyone’s soul poorer with their empty messages. I will tell you hard truths, and they are not always comfortable but if you want to grow you have to face unpleasant things.
- Jobs are not the answer to fulfillment in life. LinkedIn wants to promote that jobs will make you happy and everything is designed to help you buy into that lie. Having a sufficient income is necessary, but beyond that, a job is just that. The more you buy into the overwork mentality, the less human and happy you are. There is a balance in life that LinkedIn never acknowledges.
- The older social media becomes the more it becomes trashy. Communities corrode when hurtful and unhelpful behavior is allowed. For example yesterday someone commented on a post about the war in Israel and the thread had nothing to do with that. Hijacking a conversation isn’t respectful and it shouldn’t be allowed. There need to be consequences for people who can’t stay on topic.
- People are interacting on LinkedIn while they are working. There is nothing wrong with having the page open to respond to messages that might be helpful or to do research, but people now think of LinkedIn like Facebook. It is looked at as entertainment not educational. Nothing wrong with occasional entertainment, but that is not the goal. Or is it that social media is more about BS than useful things? The balance of noise to useful information is low and gets worse the more time passes.
If I don’t like LinkedIn why am I here? I have sincere friends who I have met while working and I maintain those relationships here. I am disappointed how often I feel I have wasted time on LinkedIn even when trying to learn/engage.