The Social Network

/ masher

I’ve mentioned here before, that I don’t do social media.

I’m not a member of InstaFace or the Twitters or any of the other online hangouts that the masses seem drawn to.

Admittedly, when I was younger and going through my experimental phase, I dabbled in a bit of Friends Reunited, but I wasn’t addicted to it and I could have quit it anytime I wanted to.

Which I eventually did.

My one concession to the genre, however, has been LinkedIn.

I was persuaded to join LinkedIn back in 2008 or so, when I was contracting. “It could help you get another job”, I was told.

It never has.

Yes, I’ve received a number of emails from recruiting agencies over the years, offering me six-month contracts in Outer Mongolia, and stuff like that, but never anything decent.  Admittedly, I’ve not actually followed up on most of the recruiting mails that I’ve received, so maybe there could have been something half-decent in there… we’ll never know.

But, LinkedIn has always got on my nerves: people I’ve never heard of… wanting to join my ‘network’.

People I worked with years ago and can barely remember… wanting to join my ‘network’.

People that I knew only fleetingly whilst contracting (engineers that pass in the night)… wanting to join my ‘network’.

To me, for most LinkedIn members, it wasn’t so much about connecting with people who could help you find a new job, but more about how many connections they could get in their own ‘networks’.

And the constant emails:

“Masher, somebody you’ve never heard of just posted something that might interest you”.

“Masher, sombody else you’ve never heard of is congratulating you for five-years at the Acme Water Company”.

“Masher, your career trajectory is gaining momentum! Add these people who you don’t know, to your network and see it really take off!”

I was right fed up with it so, today, I took the decision to close my account.

When I tried to do so, as well as deleting the account, it also gave me an option to ‘pause’ it and hide it from public view.  At first, I was tempted by this option, but then thought better of it and permanently deleted the account.

I immediately received an email from them, saying they were sorry to see me go.

The feeling isn’t mutual.

I’m free! Free, ya hear me? FREE!

Ha ha ha ha ha…

8 thoughts on “The Social Network”

    • And that’s the main reason I jacked in Friends Reunited – I realised that there was a reason I hadn’t kept in touch with these people. 🙂

  2. LinkedIn is a bit odd. I get more WhatsApp messages from people I used to work with than messages via LinkedIn. And wasn’t FriendsReunited only a way of hooking up with former schoolfriends for a shag?

    • I think FR was more a way of finding out who in your class had done well and had a high-flying career, and who hadn’t.

  3. Oh no. You have reduced my connections. I also dont visit InstaFace, twitter and LinkedIn very often but am present on all of them and tend to like random posts rather than from individuals. You still are on one I believe by default.. Yammer

    • Crikey, forgot about that one! I don’t think I can remove myself from that, can I? Doesn’t matter… don’t look at it. I have a rule set up in Outlook to auto-delete those daily update messages.

  4. Yeah, it’s a bit weird. I’m on it but don’t really get it. I think it’s like an online version of a business network. Boring. Nobody cares. I post my blogs to mine and nobody cares but Prince Albazeek is interested in connecting and showing me his Bitcoin!

Comments are closed.