Microsoft LinkedIn is Broken and Why Microsoft will Replace it With Something Better

As it turns out, censuring open source content on the internet is very hard.

My initial title

The initial title of my article was :

Post-mortem : How I Trapped LinkedIn and Why Microsoft Will Replace It With Something Better

When you read "the trap" in the context of this article, it meant that I knew with 100% absolute certainty that I could get LinkedIn to do censorship against me. I knew that they would do it in a very dumb way, that would be a bad look for them. And that I was expecting that moment with great pleasure to publish my article

But I'm out of social media, I need to get this out, and I so much don't care about them right now, that let's do just it.

My real thesis now

Microsoft LinkedIn is a Bad Way To Get a Tech Job Or Hire a Dev And You Don't Need It And There Are Multiple Better Ways.

I know, this is a lot to take. We all know that devs love LinkedIn. And it's a huge 12 years long story for me, but we have to start somewhere.

Jean-Michel, you are acting weird recently, are you ok ?

Wow, it has been a wild ride.
I was not acting my usual self, all the people that new me noticed it and were afraid, I had to do lots of explanation behind the scenes.

Their questions were always the same :

Why why I acting so strange since August ?
Why was I suddenly doing lots of clickbaits ?
Why was my content seem suddenly so over the top ?
Why was everything so confusing and hard to understand ?
Why did it seem like I was going atomic on getting maximum visibility ?

The short answer is that I had to spend too much time on Microsoft LinkedIn.

But that dark parenthesis is over, now my content is open source on Microsoft GitHub.

It's not the first time I do that, and I'm not the first to do it, but there is no coherent story, because every single time someone suggests that We Shall Improve Job Hunting Somewhat, this triggers something very deep indeed.

Toxic Tech Bro Culture Lashes Out

😤 What the F# are you talking about ? Why would you like to use LinkedIn to bring more visibility to your content like everyone else ? Why are you using LinkedIn against itself ? This is very unfair ? How the hell can they do censorhip against you if you put in into open source ? Don't you realize that LinkedIn is a top tier way to get a job and that every developer love them ? And also you are such an hypocryte ! You say LinkedIn is not perfeect, and yet here you are, using LinkedIn to get more visibility.

But the worse is yet to come

🤬 And you also admit that it was an obvious trap all along ? You are a pathetic dirtpoor cheese-eeating surrendering liberty eating communist loving feminazi looser !!!!!!!!!

Don't ask what you should do instead because the answer is always the same.

🙊 Stop being such a pathetic looser and do like me, pull yourself by your own bootstraps, and try harder to be successfull like Elon Musk. He is richer than you, did you notice ? So just shut up

At the point you need to take a deep breath and give this poor soul an helping hand.

Friend, this human being is hurting, can't you hear the voice in his head ?

Wait ?
What ?
Why is he treating me with kindness ?
What is this emotion I am feeling right now ?
Is it anger ?
Isn't anger an emotion ?
I thought I was a pure rational human being and that only the Female could be emotionally triggered.
Wait how plausible is that, given that even my dog have emotions and that they part of nature ?
Was I mistaken all along ?
How is that possible since I am smart in other areas ?
Maybe the women were right about sexism in tech....
Maybe I should do more google search and empathy and listening
Shit, it hurts

Take a deep breathe.

Yes it hurts right now, but it will get better with time.
You are just a normal human being with both emotions and brain, both skills and flaws.
You are healing right now.
Welcome back.

We Can Improve Tech Hiring Somewhat

Ok, so now let's talk about how obvious my trap was and how LinkedIn falled for it.

To understand it, you need to accept the assumption "Monopoly is Bad".

If you are Peter Thiel and you think, not at all, it's good for society because it make people like me rich and powerful, fine with me, but there is no point in reading this further.

Long story short

• I have a personal trauma deeply related to Tech Hiring being Somewhat Not Good since 2007
• Therefore I have lots of content about this, I have spoken with lots of people about it
• But since overcoming personal trauma is not that simple, it is not until August 2023 that I decided to publish it in the most open way possible.
• I decided to publish it on LinkedIn because at that time it was the only place where it made sense to get visibility for me
• To be transparent, I that time I already thought LinkedIn was mostly useless to find a developer job or to recruit a developer for a company
• But I cared more about overcoming my personal trauma and transforming it into something positive
• I was relieved when it finally happened, and that it strucked a chord with many people
• Right after I did that, LinkedIn just decided to do censorhip against me at the worst possible way for the worst possible reason in the worst possible way
• I was absolutely shattered to my core
• Thanks god I had lots of support around me during this absolutely hellish period
• When I finally recovered, I decided to go full balistic because of course I had to, what the hell ?
• I then decided to devise the most obvious trap ever whatever it takes
• I was absolutely certain they would fall for it

So, was what this little experiment of mine ?

Since you have accepted my promise "Monopoly = Bad", you will see, it's very obvious.

Microsoft LinkedIn Tried to Censor Open Source Content On The Internet

I wanted to go full balistic and make an absolutely scientific experiment to show my case.

The plan was pretty simple :

• Monopoly = Bad, therefore most devs dislike LinkedIn
• Monopoly = Bad, and the internet, devs and open source absolutely hate it
• Monopoly = Bad, meaning it mostly cares about preserving itself
• Monopoly = Bad, therefore thing get stupider with time
• Monopoly = Bad, therefore if I announce clearly that I will put my content as open source on the internet, they would not understand the trap, and falled for it.

Was I right ? Of course I was.

My content is now OpenSource on Microsoft GitHub

I mean it's a work in progress, there is all the content I have written here since 6 years to add for example. But it will be there

https://github.com/jmfayard/agentdouble.dev

You can contribute to it here like you usually do.

Since it is open source, I also put it here, put it on my website.

You are free to publish it on LinkedIn, who definitely doesn't censor content that doesn't suit its purpose but if you want to try for yourself please do it.

You are free to publish on X.com ex Twitter, since Elon Musk is a big warrior of Freedom of Speech.

Basically, you do anything you want with like usual, it's just open source content on the internet.

And while I despise LinkedIn for hurting me, I now have to thank them for the visibility, the last piece I needed.

One more thing, there is a deep irony here

Microsoft

When I was young, I was immature, believe it or not, and I thought that Microsoft was full of bullshit.
There were lonely voices like Joel Spolsky who tried to warn people like me that no, Microsoft was in fact a top tier tech company.

Granted, many things were not optimal back then.
As it turns out, building a whole operating system with all its components is very hard.
And with the benefits of that hinsight, no shit sherlock.
But time passed, and we all moved on.

Microsoft

It is now so obvious that Microsoft is a top tier company with a stellar track record that it had become a monopoly on the developer ecosystem.

This time, their unfair advantage is just that they are very very good at what they do.

So what would be a better place to put my content than on Microsoft GitHub and dared MIcrosoft LinkedIn to try to censor it ?

Microsoft

Wait there is more.
I have no insider knowledge of what happens at Microsoft, but I'm betting that there are many people who despise LinkedIn as much as I do.
How do I know it ?
I just told you, Microsoft is a top tier tech company with a stellar record.

Wait but there is more.

Microsoft

Do you know which company knows better than anyone that tech monopolies are inddeed monopoly ?

Ever heard of Microsoft Internet Explorer vs The European Union ?

Thanks LinkedIn

Wait, but there is more.

Nobody Can Do a Better Job at Fixing Tech Hiring than Microsoft

How do I know that ?

I just told you.

Microsoft is a top tier company with a stellar track record