If you’ve followed me, you might have noticed that I had pulled back my activities on LinkedIn gradually: I posted less, stopped interacting and deleted my content.
But I kept returning – only to feel the same mix of disappointment and annoyance every time. Eventually, I asked myself: Why did I keep coming back – even though it never felt useful?
And after a while I noticed: I was looking for distraction. Just some tech related news from real people. Something interesting, valuable or amusing that people share.
Simply quitting LinkedIn wouldn’t solve that. The urge for distraction doesn’t vanish just because I close a tab. I needed a replacement!
What Made Me Finally Leave
Maybe a quick recap what my actual problem is/was: Actually, it wasn’t just a single issue. But the issues just piled up over time:
- It’s yet another walled garden. Those platforms always act the same way and I don’t want to support that model any longer.
- I am feeding someone else’s platform. I gift my content to a company and I don’t feel I’m getting something appropriate back.
- The typical LinkedIn content isn’t my style any more. You probably know what I mean.
- The inability to self curate my feed! After a while on Mastodon, I know how liberating it feels to control the feed myself.
But the tipping point was finally when someone posted that someone said they were really looking forward to joining the OMR Festival. I wanted to filter that out. Which I couldn’t except not opening LinkedIn for a couple of days. And then I said to myself: okay, I need to change something.
What I Did Instead
TL;DR: I created a new Mastodon account. (okay, surprised? ;-))
I explicitly did not want to re-use my photography-related account as the topics are completely different. I opted for a tech-focused instance, followed a few hashtags and people and configured my filters to hide all the topics that I didn’t want to see.
When I want light distraction now, I log onto that server. I scroll. I read, like – sometimes comment. And most important: I don’t leave annoyed. My posts auto-delete after a short period of time, my profile isn’t searchable and I don’t plan to promote my profile.
And since a month, I haven’t logged in to LinkedIn (except for posting an un-commentable link to a blogpost). And I don’t miss it at all!
The content that I would have posted on LinkedIn will appear on my blog here which can be followed via RSS or from the Fediverse (@blog). I know I’ll lose some readers who don’t want to use RSS or Mastodon – and that’s okay.
Stay Connected
If you’re publishing outside the big platforms: drop me your handle, feed, or link.
If you just want to follow: I recommend Feedly as an RSS Reader, or just give Mastodon a try.