Faced with the accelerating disappearance of translation work from their normal translation broker clients, freelancers translators will not find much use in LinkedIn, and the value of the platform to just about anyone has seriously diminished, for a number of reasons.
- TikTok-like videos, including promotion of crypto.
- Misdirected ads looking for people to train AI to take their jobs.
- Countless narcissistic self-congratulatory posts by people with not much to offer other than narcissistic self-congratulatory posts.
- Self-styled coaches working the aisles of desperate people looking for jobs.
- Countless requests to connect from people who mistakenly think I am either a potential source of translation work for them or a customer for their coaching. I am neither.
- Requests to connect from people who not only have had no engagement with me, but also have no commonality of interests with me and who have mindlessly bought into the fantasy that lots of connections on LinkedIn means “LinkedIn success,” but haven’t figured out that “LinkedIn success” will not put food on the table.
- And, among translator users of LinkedIn, a growing unwillingness to face what is happening, which is clearly that machine translation is eliminating their ability to make a living. Delusions and denials abound, and people pointing out the problem, even in a non-hostile tone, are seen to be a nuisance. It’s ending for the deniers, but they will continue their mindless denial until the end arrives for them, which is visible on the horizon.