Or, more accurately, they’re posts I’m never going to post. Some of them have already been written and mothballed for various reasons. Some I might write out all the way, but only in a journaling kind of way, an email-you’re-never-going-to-send kind of way that’ll never see daylight. Here’s a collection of those posts, and why you’ll never get to read them.
“Some CEOs are nice, but their AI resume sorters are jerks.”
This one is about all the CEOs who post on LinkedIn about hiring nontraditional candidates, and about how a degree doesn’t matter as much as personal integrity or whatever, and it’s a genuinely good philosophy to embrace — but their AI resume sorter means they never actually get to meet a nontraditional candidate because everyone without a degree gets filtered out.
It’ll never see daylight because: When you’re a freelancer or a job-searcher, pissing off CEOs isn’t a good idea. And calling them out as disingenuous and/or out of touch on LinkedIn is definitely the kind of thing that’s going to piss them off.
“Agencies: When clients are stupid, you need to tell your freelancers”
This is a sympathetic, respectful post talking to agencies about their clients who sometimes make stupid choices and then stick to them. It advises agencies that if you have such a client, you need to warn your freelance creative, because otherwise they’re going to be working hard to get the thing right when rounds of revisions could be spared by, “Oh, btw, the client actually prefers it wrong.”
It’ll never see daylight because: As above: if you’re a freelancer who (like I do) has a client base heavily weighted on the agency side, telling them all they’re Doin It Rong isn’t likely to curry their favor.
“A Come-to-Jesus with Employers About Expectations”
This one’s a response to a since-deleted LinkedIn post by an employer miffed that an outgoing employee didn’t show adequate loyalty and appreciation for all that had been provided to her. My response gently pointed out that, remote work and a “nice” boss notwithstanding, a culture where employees feel their company shows loyalty and appreciation to them is more valuable than any perks that, realistically, usually fall within their TCP anyway.
It’ll never see daylight because: Honestly, I stand behind every word I wrote that you won’t see, but putting them all out on Beyonce’s internet would definitely make me look demanding and whiny and disloyal, and I’m objectively not those things, so it’s staying in the hopper.
“I think we can all agree the ChatGPT is a lousy copywriter.”
I mean, what it says on the tin. The post is about using ChatGPT as a replacement for human copywriters, and how some outlets are willing to accept a dip in quality in exchange for cost savings that come with having a robot on staff, and even the best ChatGPT-produced copy is always identifiable as written by ChatGPT.
It’ll never see daylight because: Everyone knows this. Or, at least, everyone has heard this. The ones who don’t want to believe it won’t until they’re faced with the repercussions of not believing it. The ones who believe it don’t need me to tell them about it again. (But if you want me to, there’s this book you can read coughshamelessplugcough.)
“Advice to the CDC on Communicating About COVID-19”
This was a post from the perspective of a person who’s done a lot of writing for healthcare and research, looking at the CDC’s communication efforts around issues like vaccine reluctance. It was a pretty good post, honestly, but it ended up lost in the shuffle of, y’know, pandemic.
I’ll never see daylight because: Well. I mean. You know. Obviously super timely and relevant now. (Also not worth posting: advice for creatives who are just starting out with remote work, antiquated marketing tools that have been revived thanks to the pandemic.)
Not every post is ready for primetime.
If there’s one takeaway from this list of never-rans, it’s that everything we write doesn’t have to be read by someone who isn’t us. Some thoughts are inside thoughts. But also, particularly for writery types, there is value in writing them out anyway — organizing those thoughts and examining the feelings that have gotten us het up on a given subject — as if for another audience, from a different perspective.
And then hiding them far, far away where no one else will ever see them.
Keep it secret, keep it safe.
While I have you: I think everyone is looking forward to a special occasion this weekend: the official kickoff of Weepy Awards season. As you enjoy the commercials that have been increasingly added to your formerly commercial-free streaming services, keep an eye out for the holiday ads that bring the sniffles and let me know about them (here in comments, yonder on social media, whatever). Then watch this space to see if your favorites have been deemed worthy of a 2024 Weepy.