LinkedIn-style text
Lately, there has been a particular genre of articles/text posts that are making the rounds on the Internet. It’s not a formal format, but just a specific pattern that I’ve observed from such kind of text. Granted, there’s also no official term for them, but I’m gonna call them LinkedIn-style text, because of how much they resemble (suspiciously LLM-generated) posts that appear on LinkedIn nowadays.
According to my very personal observation, they share the following traits:
- They usually include anecdotes or personal stories that sound sensational, or attempt to resonate with as many people as possible.
- They only have one sentence — two if we’re lucky — per paragraph on average.
- Most sentences are at most 10 words long.
- They emphasise the author’s personal achievements, or a product/service they want to promote.
- In some more blatant cases, they are littered with unnecessary emojis.
Here are two examples of what I mean by LinkedIn-style text, one of which being a blog post, and another being something actually on LinkedIn.
Why am I talking about this here? The reason is simple: it pisses me off. A lot. I despise them for how much they are trying to sound down-to-earth and relatable, but are actually aiming for the very opposite, which is to be as performative and flashy in front of others as possible. It’s a bit like the Instagram situation, but even harder to detect.
As a result, they end up looking increasingly lifeless, one-dimensional and insincere to me. As I see more and more of such posts, I feel more and more jaded instead of encouraged.
However, sadly, I think that this particular type of text isn’t going to disappear — or at least render into obscurity — anytime soon. This is because they are very effective in catching people’s attention, even though those who actually read them may find themselves demotivated.
I think that if this rant goes out to the mass public, my career prospect is going to be greatly affected. At least, I may have a hard time looking for corporate jobs.
Still, this rant doesn’t mean that I don’t want people to share their life achievements; far from it, in fact. I just hope that I can see more transparent discussions of their personal struggles (or lack thereof) along the way. At the very least, I want to feel like I’m reading something that actually comes from a human’s mind. Messy, vulnerable and yet still capable of accomplishing something beneficial.
Further reading: