8 ms·

I saw a Meta employee post a “my company rocks” post on LinkedIn this week. Almost all of the replies were from Meta employees, and almost all of them were hyp

I saw a Meta employee post a “my company rocks” post on LinkedIn this week. Almost all of the replies were from Meta employees, and almost all of them were hyper enthusiastic. It was almost like cult members reaffirming each other that they’re still in a high functioning group. Now of course LinkedIn is gonna LinkedIn, but this post was cranked up to an 11.

KyeRussell 5y ago
This is genuinely how California/SV tech culture feels to people looking in, me included.
- tdeck 5y ago
  I was really apprehensive about this kind of "cultiness" when I moved out to SF in 2014 for my first engineering job. Luckily it really dropped off after company onboarding and I hardly ever heard this kind of talk from my normal colleagues.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    I see it all the time when someone from such companies is doing a talk. - "it is great to be here" - "I am inspired to let you know about.." - "It is delightfull experience..." - "It is such an amazing...." - "What a great opportunity...." " "It is my priviledge...."
    - tdeck 5y ago
      Yep, but when they're doing a talk they're playing a role. It's like when you're interviewing, you probably turn on the BS a bit. Most people don't do talks of any kind for their company so that group is already not representative of what it's like to work in company X on a day-to-day basis. That said, some things are true. E.g. Googlers are pretty self-congratulatory although there are plenty of internal cynics as well.
    - thaumasiotes 5y ago
      There was a great bit from Conan O'Brien's "celebrity secrets" series in which David Bowie delivered the following dialogue: > I was on tour in the United States back in '89, and we did a show in Cincinnati. > During that show, I shouted out, "It's great to be in Cincinnati!" > That was a lie.
    - nitwit005 5y ago
      That is, perhaps unfortunately, not a thing limited to tech companies. My personal theory is that a lot of executives seem sold on this idea that they'll somehow hire a staff of people enthused to work there, for whom it's their dream job. People who act like that's true get ahead in those companies.
      - pjmlp 5y ago
        Yes, for me it has the effect to just turn off my attention to whatever follows.
- opportune 5y ago
  A lot of the time this stuff is just coordinated by HR for marketing/recruiting. It’s not just a SV thing (plenty of companies have these awkward forced “Yay I love it here!” posts) and not even just a tech or corporate thing (even fast food restaurants will do stuff like this), but I guess it is an American thing.
  - geraldwhen 5y ago
    We have internal work software that can autopost to linkedin for you in a compliant manner. It has prebaked responses to articles to be shared. HR gave a presentation on the shilling software and I couldn’t stop laughing.
sn41 5y ago
On the other hand, being honest on LinkedIn may not be wise. I have never seen anyone not being enthusiastic on LinkedIn.
- harry8 5y ago
  Have you ever seen interesting, clever, sensible, empathetic and lovely people being silent on linkedin? Ignoring hype posts from their colleagues on linkedin?
- mathgladiator 5y ago
  Hold my beer. I'm starting an honest company. The key is that I'm basically retired. Have no desire to hire anyone. Have no desire to seek funding. My three company values are: (1) sleep, (2) slow is smooth, and smooth is fast, (3) freedom at all costs. I'm probably going to get banned on linked in once I start promoting things, but the goal is to just shit post on all the inspiration.
- kumarvvr 5y ago
  The damper on LinkedIn as a social network in one sentence. People don't be their real selves on LinkedIn. And once you know the artificiality of every post on it, you being to hate it.
kerneloftruth 5y ago
Just the kind of people who would embrace absurd cultspeak like "Metamate". They deserve each other.
- netsharc 5y ago
  Like the people who, legend has it, clap for minutes during Stalin's (or Saddam's) speeches, because they don't want to be the first to be seen to stop clapping...
joezydeco 5y ago
This one creeped me out more. Taken from my LinkedIn feed from someone starting at Meta: https://imgur.com/a/LOD7wMC https://imgur.com/a/LOD7wMC Socks? Okay, cute. Socks for the rest of your family, and they already know enough about the ages of your children to send those sizes as well? Holy shit.
- bag_boy 5y ago
  The new employee probably filled out a form that asked what kind of start date swag/sizing they wanted

KyeRussell 5y ago

This is genuinely how California/SV tech culture feels to people looking in, me included.

tdeck 5y ago
I was really apprehensive about this kind of "cultiness" when I moved out to SF in 2014 for my first engineering job. Luckily it really dropped off after company onboarding and I hardly ever heard this kind of talk from my normal colleagues.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  I see it all the time when someone from such companies is doing a talk. - "it is great to be here" - "I am inspired to let you know about.." - "It is delightfull experience..." - "It is such an amazing...." - "What a great opportunity...." " "It is my priviledge...."
  - tdeck 5y ago
    Yep, but when they're doing a talk they're playing a role. It's like when you're interviewing, you probably turn on the BS a bit. Most people don't do talks of any kind for their company so that group is already not representative of what it's like to work in company X on a day-to-day basis. That said, some things are true. E.g. Googlers are pretty self-congratulatory although there are plenty of internal cynics as well.
  - thaumasiotes 5y ago
    There was a great bit from Conan O'Brien's "celebrity secrets" series in which David Bowie delivered the following dialogue: > I was on tour in the United States back in '89, and we did a show in Cincinnati. > During that show, I shouted out, "It's great to be in Cincinnati!" > That was a lie.
  - nitwit005 5y ago
    That is, perhaps unfortunately, not a thing limited to tech companies. My personal theory is that a lot of executives seem sold on this idea that they'll somehow hire a staff of people enthused to work there, for whom it's their dream job. People who act like that's true get ahead in those companies.
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      Yes, for me it has the effect to just turn off my attention to whatever follows.
opportune 5y ago
A lot of the time this stuff is just coordinated by HR for marketing/recruiting. It’s not just a SV thing (plenty of companies have these awkward forced “Yay I love it here!” posts) and not even just a tech or corporate thing (even fast food restaurants will do stuff like this), but I guess it is an American thing.
- geraldwhen 5y ago
  We have internal work software that can autopost to linkedin for you in a compliant manner. It has prebaked responses to articles to be shared. HR gave a presentation on the shilling software and I couldn’t stop laughing.

sn41 5y ago

On the other hand, being honest on LinkedIn may not be wise. I have never seen anyone not being enthusiastic on LinkedIn.

harry8 5y ago
Have you ever seen interesting, clever, sensible, empathetic and lovely people being silent on linkedin? Ignoring hype posts from their colleagues on linkedin?
mathgladiator 5y ago
Hold my beer. I'm starting an honest company. The key is that I'm basically retired. Have no desire to hire anyone. Have no desire to seek funding. My three company values are: (1) sleep, (2) slow is smooth, and smooth is fast, (3) freedom at all costs. I'm probably going to get banned on linked in once I start promoting things, but the goal is to just shit post on all the inspiration.
kumarvvr 5y ago
The damper on LinkedIn as a social network in one sentence. People don't be their real selves on LinkedIn. And once you know the artificiality of every post on it, you being to hate it.

kerneloftruth 5y ago

Just the kind of people who would embrace absurd cultspeak like "Metamate". They deserve each other.

netsharc 5y ago
Like the people who, legend has it, clap for minutes during Stalin's (or Saddam's) speeches, because they don't want to be the first to be seen to stop clapping...

joezydeco 5y ago

This one creeped me out more. Taken from my LinkedIn feed from someone starting at Meta: https://imgur.com/a/LOD7wMC https://imgur.com/a/LOD7wMC Socks? Okay, cute. Socks for the rest of your family, and they already know enough about the ages of your children to send those sizes as well? Holy shit.

bag_boy 5y ago
The new employee probably filled out a form that asked what kind of start date swag/sizing they wanted