Silicon Valley's Language Bubble

An article in the San Francisco Examiner yesterday declared there is no tech bubble in San Francisco (which, by the way is arguably not technically part of the Silicon Valley, but has become synonymous with it). There may not be a tech bubble, but with talk of "unicorns" (startups that go on to become billion dollar companies) and "journeys," as in "the customer's journey" (used to describe what is called "customer service" anywhere else), I think it's time we try to pop Silicon Valley's insidious language bubble.

Silicon Valley startups live in another world, judging by their job postings. I joined a San Mateo-based startup in 2009 and stayed for four years. I eventually left and joined state government, but periodically I look at vacancies and see who's hiring. What I've found are job descriptions that read like excerpts from B-movie screenplays.

A prime example is the use of the word "rockstar." A keyword search on the startup job site VentureLoop reveals 183 jobs containing that tired metaphor. One company is looking for "an overall rockstar that can spearhead the company to global greatness." Another is looking for a a "rockstar intern." Imagine that for a moment. In the music world, rockstars are rarely team players, they snort cocaine, trash hotel rooms, and let their record label pay the bill.

If you're a rockstar in the high-tech world, it means you're exceptionally good at what you do. It implies you have "passion" (7,457 listings), which is hopefully not of a sexual or violent nature. It may also imply you have "Jedi"-like talent (14 listings), or that you are on the "journey to becoming a Yoda."

The word "journey" is surprisingly abundant (1,375 listings). Companies write about "the customer’s journey," and "helping clients across their journey." One wonders if there are any openings for people who merely order paper clips and fill out tax forms, because, in the end the business of writing code, scheduling meetings, and cleaning bathrooms is the same everywhere.

Are crazy job postings evidence of lazy thinking, or are they written by programmers? The abundance of pat phrases and boilerplate wording resembles object-oriented programming, which is one step removed from writing lines of programming code. Object oriented programmers rely on libraries of pre-written code, and their job is to arrange blocks of pre-written code and connect them. Similarly, many job descriptions are blocks of words cobbled together with little thought given to overall coherence or logical consistency. Trying to understand them requires mental gymnastics.

George Orwell said people who mechanically repeat familiar phrases are one step closer toward becoming machines. One wonders if artificial intelligence will soon be used to write job descriptions, and if so, will the descriptions be intelligent, or will they read like they were written by a robot? Our use of language influences our thinking, so what do incomprehensible job descriptions say about the companies posting them?