May 12, 2026
Buzzwords, egos, and pure nonsense
The Rise of the Bullshittery
Why the loudest fakes keep winning while everyone else rage-scrolls
TLDR: The article argues that online popularity now beats real skill, rewarding people who sound smart instead of people who do good work. Commenters piled on with jokes about LinkedIn being an infomercial, a swipe at chatbots as “bullshitters,” and calls to escape into smaller, more trustworthy communities.
This opinion piece came in swinging: modern work no longer rewards the people quietly doing solid, careful jobs — it rewards the people who look impressive online. The author drags LinkedIn as a parade of empty buzzwords, fake confidence, and endless “thought leadership” from people apparently leading absolutely nothing. The big idea is simple and brutal: truth is losing to visibility, and the internet keeps handing the microphone to whoever sounds slickest.
But the real fireworks were in the comments, where readers turned the post into a mini roast festival. One of the hottest takes came from a commenter who basically said today’s chatbots are, by definition, “bullshitters” too — which is the kind of spicy claim guaranteed to start a thousand arguments. Another person nailed the vibe by comparing LinkedIn to late-night infomercials, which honestly feels so accurate it hurts. And then there was the gloriously petty drive-by complaint: someone admitted they “simply cannot click such a domain name,” proving that on the internet, even the website name can become part of the drama.
Not everyone just wanted to complain, though. One calmer voice suggested the escape route is smaller online spaces — places like Discord, where trust and reputation matter more than going viral. Even that felt like a subtle dig at the bigger platforms: maybe the only way to survive the nonsense machine is to log off the main stage and find a smaller room where people can still tell who actually knows what they’re talking about.
Key Points
- •The article argues that professional rewards are increasingly tied to appearing competent and gaining visibility rather than doing high-quality work.
- •It uses Harry Frankfurt’s 1986 essay *On Bullshit* to distinguish between lying and indifference to truth.
- •The author says an older model of professional advancement relied more on skill, work quality, and reputation among knowledgeable peers.
- •The article claims algorithmic visibility has become a dominant mechanism for distributing professional opportunity.
- •It cites a 2024 study of more than 6,500 U.S. state legislators that found low-credibility information correlated positively with attention on major platforms.