“You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain” – Harvey Dent (The Dark Knight)
This is such a mind blowing quote. The more you observe, you will find more and more instances of how true it is. I have come across many real life examples – an ex-boss who stayed too long, a cricketer who held on too long to be criticized, an actor who is acting in younger role even after turning 55 are just very few of those. To me, it resonates well with the current state of content sharing websites these days. The longer you stay with these articles, you start hating them. This is expected from the content on Facebook, alright. But sites for professionals like LinkedIn and Inc.com are losing it slowly, in my opinion. I would not complain these companies themselves. They are catering to the readers, especially the new readers.
If you have been reading the contents for a while now, you might have identified these themes:
– All the articles are related to the current topics that are hot or current holiday season.
– 90% of them have a sensational title and content will be nothing.
– Most of them are plain old wine is new bottles. (Wine will taste better though)
– Some of them tell if you follow their routine, you will become a better leader.
– Some of them tell if you follow your routine instead of theirs, you will be a bad leader.
– One person writes something positive, one something negative and one not related at all – about the same topic.
– Most of them try to advice you on how to run your life.
– Most of them talk about personalities/habits of successful people (Very generalized. Again a cocktail of old wines in a new bottle. But I agree, everybody is a sucker for these types)
– And not to forget those 25 quotes to kick start your New Year types.
All the contents are based on the current affairs in the world. And these articles are in no way a news item or information. More often than not, I find these as the personal opinion of authors. And the number of authors/ influencers is one too many. While some of them are real refreshing, most of them present the same thing again and again in different formats. So around the long weekend of July 4th, you see all the authors writing something in relation to Independence and July 4th; on Thanksgiving it’s how you can send a thank you note or how you can shop for thanksgiving or gratitude makes you a better person. Around Christmas and New Year, you know what’s coming! Ah! It’s Christmas.
I am not whining because I think I can write better content. No, I can’t. I am just appalled at how much of a chore it has become rather than knowledge/experience sharing. After a point, you can see through the articles just by reading few lines. To be frank, the content is being forced. You HAVE to write something to share almost every day. You HAVE to get the maximum hits possible. The more comments you get more power to you. There are more articles being churned from every topic and I feel it’s an overkill. And I’m not even going to talk about “share this picture in 7 seconds for luck” stuff floating around in LinkedIn.
I personally would love to subscribe to a site that generates good and original content and I won’t honestly mind the frequency.
Pointless & Prosaic 