Finally deleted my LinkedIn account!
After putting my account into “hibernation” for the past few weeks, I finally closed it. But I’m still looking for work. Thankfully I can still find positions (SRE and software dev) by just going directly to the company’s site and finding a Jobs page.
Good luck to everyone else out there looking for work!
I keep LinkedIn telling myself it’s necessary to find a job but I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a job from LinkedIn, now that I think about it.
but I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a job from LinkedIn, now that I think about it.
Yeah that was it for me. I got loads of messages from recruiters but they were really low effort communication. I even put in things like “INCLUDE THE WORD GLENDA IF YOU READ MY PROFILE” near the top of my profile/experience section. Out of the hundreds of messages, I’d say fewer than 10 actually wrote “GLENDA”!
The conversations I did end up having were shitty anyway. Essentially I think the world got software fever over the past few years and it’s only just recently cooling down. People going into recruiting without any people skills, let alone industry knowledge. Companies desperate to hire people for no reason, including people who just did that “Quit your job and start coding!” nonsense.
I’ve never gotten a job from LinkedIn but I feel like that’s also one where potential employers might view not having one as a red flag? Like maybe it’s better to keep something up with a basic profile and job history matching your resume, but not actively using?
I’ve never gotten a job from LinkedIn but I feel like that’s also one where potential employers might view not having one as a red flag?
My hope is that any future employers may understand where I’m coming from by not having an account there. Not sure whether that really works out in the real world, though. Only one way to find out, I guess!
I’ve usually found things on Indeed and am starting to have some success with freelance/contracts on Upwork. I’ve also had some personal network connections to jobs, but that’s never been through LinkedIn, just knowing someone at a company and then thinking I’d be a good fit for an opening.
I got recruits to buy me coffee while I ranted at them about the tech industry. That was cool, but wasn’t worth how much noise is in the inbox nor the privacy concerns of having your data & network stored with Microsoft, so I deleted my account a few years ago.
I’d love to delete all accounts associated with Microsoft, but we need to bully projects off of MS GitHub that refuse to acknowledge the privacy concerns (as well as the mental health issues caused as a result of turning a code forge into a social media platform that your job probably makes you uses). npm falls in this same category but is easier to avoid.
I got recruits to buy me coffee while I ranted at them about the tech industry.
Hold on… that’s awesome. Shit maybe I deleted my account too soon…
I mean, I get physically sick of the idea of the worst mindless parts of the corporate world being spammed around the genuinely amazing project that is the Internet. But paying for coffee sucks, too ;)
I’ve gotten almost all my jobs, and probably a handful of offers, and more messages from recruiters than I can count, through LinkedIn…it’s definitely the easiest way to find and get a job IME. I don’t think I’ve gone “job hunting” since I was fresh out of university looking for my first job.
Went through a couple comments of both „still use it“ and „dont need it at all“.
We need a fedi linkedin clone
Its again totally obvious that we need a fediverse linkedin clone, especially geared towards work, with a full cv function, option to hide your personal data until you approve a future employer, ways like mastodon for companies to prove they are legit to even be able to see a persons personal data so they dont dox themselves to some rando.
I cant do it on my own but willing to help
I‘m unable to set this up so please take the idea and run with it. Probably just a mastodon fork tbh with specific features. If anyone feels like doing this and needs business knowledge from an entrepreneur/CEO perspective, lmk.
Thank you for reading and have a good one!
I agree that LinkedIn is shit, but I’m not sure it’ll be resolved by going fedi. IMO what would be more important is a better job posting board. LinkedIn job search sucks galactic balls. The “remote jobs” search option is a fucking joke. Keywords are so blatantly spoiled by SEO and LinkedIn refuses to clean it up.
Not sure if a federated job search board would improve the situation though…
Its you again! Your signature always identifies you instantly.
I agree that linkedin is shit. Any form of alternative would be good but honestly, I‘m not using any social media that isnt democratic anymore. So my only chance at it is making it democratic.
Have a good one.
Its you again! Your signature always identifies you instantly.
😂 Thanks, I was hoping it would’ve caught on by now, but that’s fine.
I‘m not using any social media that isnt democratic anymore
Respect. LinkedIn shouldn’t have been social media, but they went ahead and did it. I too would like an alternative.
You have a good one too 🙂
I agree that going fedi doesn’t automatically solve the issues. However, moving it away from a multi tiered paid platform (they really tailored it so they could do this) and controlling the bots/scam accounts would be a completely different experience. I think fedi would at least solve the first one, and I’d expect would help controlling the second.
option to hide your personal data until you approve a future employer
I think this is impossible in a fediverse context. Data is either shared publicly or only shared with your home instance’s admins. There’s no other sharing model as far as I know.
Thats no issue. You can make only public data federate and use p2p for sensitive data.
Public would be your skills, some text about yourself, your industries and amount of employed years in each industry without dates or companies.
Think of it like a puzzle. First part the employer gets to see. They can search „java dev 5 yrs exp“ and get 100 peeps, in state/country/remote, for xxx$ per year/month/hour.
Then they can send you a request but only if they have authenticated through their own public website like on mastodon. If you accept, they can ask you questions and talk. If you reach common ground, they can request your full cv which could be self deleting or something in case the job falls through.
Its not a perfect system but its a lot safer than sending a cv per unencrypted email imo. or answering to some rando on linkedin. Also, anyone who knows you can find you on linkedin with your clear name. Its totally crazy to decline the potential of such a project in light of the current situation.
Things could be encrypted. But yeah, that’s my biggest issue with the fediverse, it’s just not designed around privacy. It’s also why I’m working on my own lemmy alternative, I want something a bit more privacy-friendly.
I don’t think working on a LinkedIn alternative is worthwhile because it relies even more heavily on the network effect. The only point I see in LinkedIn is in finding jobs, and getting employers to look at something else is an uphill battle I don’t want to fight.
My understanding is that Activitypub federation and that sort of privacy are somewhat incompatible. Because someone could always just create a new instance and then federate the stuff you don’t want shared with them.
What difference does the federation make in this case? Either way the personal data is in someone else’s computer.
Federated means democratic. We‘re on lemmy because free association. Its obvious that all other social media, including work related, should be federated, in fact it should be outlawed to have anything public-non-federated. We need to destroy all walled gardens.
On the other topic of personal data: the critical data like real name, home address, phone number, email address, former employers etc. should absolutely not be federated, thats a need to know basis.
The public profiles are the same as mastodon and don’t constitute personal data in my book: your skills, the industries and length of employment.
The important part is that you can put your personal data on an instance (which might or might not be your own) and encrypt it so nobody except you can read it and if you get an offer, the future employer gets an encypted view of your data which could also be on auto delete if the job falls through.
Federation isn’t the magic bullet you make it out to be. In fact I disagree with pretty much everything you said, but we probably agree on some fundamental concepts. I just believe federation isn’t democratic, not even a little bit, it’s just silos of control.
I think we need distributed platforms where data is owned through encryption and signatures. Think gossip protocol with PGP encryption and web of trust based moderation. It’s still not democratic, but it puts control in the hands of individual users, not instance admins.
Similar to what Churchill said of democracy, Lemmy/ActivityPub is the worst form of social media, except for all the others. Federation isn’t the goal imo, decentralization is. It just turns out that a ActivityPub and Lemmy are available today, which is why I’m here. Reddit was the best option before now (open source frontend, friendly API, etc), but that changed so now I’m here.
So no, don’t enshrine a particular solution into law, focus on the principles of privacy and decentralization.
Shout less, please.
Also, no I won’t develop your app. Could (maybe), won’t.
I‘m not shouting. I‘m using proper headlines.
I could also not care less what you would or could do.
I‘m not shouting. I‘m using proper headlines.
Seen anyone else using them ?
I could also not care less what you would or could do.
But you use social media…
The same has occurred to me numerous times. I’m not the guy to lead the project, but I’d certainly be willing to dive in and help.
Honestly, I’m somewhat surprised there isn’t one, or at least a zygote of one, already.
I “deleted” my LinkedIn a couple years ago, and last year I started getting fucking connection request emails again.
I went to LinkedIn and lo and behold my login worked. I fucking deleted my account again. I’m sure it’s still there. Assholes.
IMO LinkedIn is a garbage for mental health, too. Where everyone wants to show off their achievements to others.
Sadly that’s true for all social media.
Some are worse than others. Every now and then I log on to Instagram because I can sometimes see fun dirtbike clips. I can comment on YouTube videos of conference talks.
I know people go to supposedly “adventurous” places on motorbikes just for clout, and I know that people at conferences often do talks that could just as easily be recorded themselves at home or even just as a text article. But at least I know, deep down, they want to share stuff with people who have a shared passion.
The stuff that gets shared around via LinkedIn feels so, so hollow in comparison. Not a lot, if anything, beneath the surface.
Worst of both worlds, the one-upping bootlicking culture, the fear of missing out on job prospects fueled by economic anxiety, with corporate enshittification liberally sprinkled in, all combined into one giant pile of turd.
And I say this as I’m also guilty of having an account on it. I also want to get rid of it, but can’t afford to risk my chances while looking for better jobs. Fuck all this.
It’s pretty much a place where everyone pats themselves on the back.
Only issue with LinkedIn is the prospect of finding jobs. I got my last job through LinkedIn actually.
I got a couple of jobs thanks to LinkedIn, I don’t know what problem people have with it. Yeah, the content is questionable, but nobody asks you to spend time scrolling the feed.
