THE STATIC

Hey You, Welcome! Here’s your weekly dose roasting tech spin, bluster and puffery. Laugh at the cringe, unjam your message.

This week in:

• Tech Waffle Torture - Decoding Meta’s linguistic acrobatics

• Shallow Values - Trust us: We love your money, not you

• Savage Takedowns - The WiseTech Sex Scandal - Who cares?

• Pop Culture Cringe - Hillary Baldwin pretends to be Spanish

• LinkedIn Templates - Get more views and likes by being vulnerable

• Dear Dr Comms - Work Xmas Party - low budget, no laughs

• WTF is the best way to say, “I’m not slapping lipstick on a pig?”

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Tech Waffle Torture Explained - We tell you what corporate speak really means. You’re welcome.

“As you navigate this transition…”

Scale AI, the shiny unicorn that just got a $14 billion valuation from investors including Mark Zuckerberg, decided to celebrate by firing an entire team in Dallas.

The email announcing it contained this gem:

“As you navigate this transition, we want to ensure you are aware of alternative opportunities.”

Let’s decode that.

Translation:

“You’re out, but we’d love for you to apply for your old job somewhere else under a new title and lower rate.”

The phrase navigate this transition deserves its own prize for linguistic acrobatics. It’s corporate code for “we don’t want to say ‘fired’ because it makes us sound mean.”

And “alternative opportunities”? A fluffy, weasel term that basically means “we’re washing our hands of you but prefer to say it nicely.”

What makes it funnier (and sadder) is that this came days after Zuckerberg poured billions into Scale AI.

Not sure if your job’s on the line?

Here are a few HR euphemisms to watch for if these are ever said in your presence (or ones to use if you’re in management):

• “We’re realigning for strategic focus.”
  Translation: Someone just circled your name in red on that list.

• “Your role is evolving.”
  Translation: Into thin air.

• “We’re sunsetting this function.”
  Translation: Pack up before the light fades.

Meaningfully Shallow Values – You get them as short and sweet ugly truths

 Trust

Trusted by Shareholders
“Keeping them happy is the sacred cow we never stop feeding, because nothing kills trust like a flat share price.”

Trusted by Customers
“Especially when we sprinkle trust words like ‘true partner,’ ‘in this together,’ ‘one team’, across every slide deck until we almost believe them ourselves.”

Trusted by Employees
“We say ‘people first,’ which is true – they’re always the first to go.”

Savage Takedowns – Spectator sport or heed the lesson

Culture That Doesn’t Change: The WiseTech Scandal, One Year On
It’s been a year since the allegations against WiseTech founder Richard White first surfaced – allegations that forced his temporary departure and sent shockwaves through Australia’s tech scene. In 2025, White has quietly returned to the board. The silence around it speaks volumes.

Spectator Sport
The tech industry loves to frame these episodes as outliers, a “bad apple,” Then it moves on. But watching a founder waltz back in, reputation intact, tells every woman in tech exactly how elastic ‘accountability’ really is.

Heed the Lesson
Culture isn’t repaired with a diversity hire or a new ‘inclusion strategy.’ It’s rebuilt through consequences – the kind that stick. Until that happens, ‘diversity’ is just the PR word we use to wallpaper over behaviour we’re unwilling to fix.

Pop Culture Cringe – Out of touch comms worth your time

The Art of Being Authentically Fake: Hilaria (Hillary) Baldwin
Hilaria Baldwin’s recent short-lived stint on Dancing With the Stars ended the way most of her public appearances do - in a cloud of melodrama and misplaced self-pity. Booted off the show, she gave an exit interview blaming ‘TikTok mean girls’ for bullying her out of the competition.

The problem isn’t that people hate her; it’s that they don’t believe her. Born Hillary Lynn Hayward-Thomas in Boston to American parents with English, Irish, German, and Slovak roots, she has a history of publicly presenting herself as Spanish born - frequently speaking with a Spanish accent, and pretending not to know certain English words. Pure cringe fakeness.

In tech, it’s like a CEO who speaks fluent innovation to investors and fluent cost-cutting to staff.

LinkedIn Popularity Templates – Syrupy, self-congratulatory. Surprisingly effective.

Template 20: The ‘Open To Being Vulnerable’ Post

Sometimes the strongest thing you can do is post about how strong you are for admitting you’re not always strong. 💪🫶

Here’s what I learned from my journey of public vulnerability:

• Authenticity performs best between 8 a.m. – 10 a.m. on weekdays. 📈
• Tears dry faster when written in carousel format. 💧
• The algorithm rewards courage, especially in bullet points. 🔥
• Healing is just content that converts. 💫

So here I am – messy, mindful and marketable.

Copy and paste if you, too, believe your vulnerable reveal deserves at least 1,000 reactions. 💖

#AuthenticityJourney #VulnerabilityIsMySuperpower #ValuesBasedBranding

Got some naval gazing or philosophical musing you’d like to turn into a syrupy LinkedIn post? Reply to this email with your request and I’ll do my best.

Dear Dr Comms – When spin fails, we call in the real professionals to fix our stuff-ups

Dear Dr Comms,

We tried to be sensible this year. No yachts, no oysters, no twelve-hour bar tabs. Just two drinks per person, some finger food, and a pub booking. The company-wide email about it… didn’t land. Half the staff have vetoed the event and labelled leadership “tight-arses.” How do we make this sound festive without adding a zero to the budget?
Yours, Cancelled Christmas

Dear Cancelled,

Looks like Christmas is a washout before it even starts. Let’s call in some professionals to rescue what’s left of the silly season.

🏀 Basketball Coach
Remind everyone it’s about team spirit. Set up a ‘Shots for Goals’ contest – one hoop per drink limit. Miss three baskets and you’re benched with mineral water.

♠️ Professional Poker Player
Swap the open bar for All-In Trivia. Winner gets bragging rights; loser buys the table a round of… sparkling water. Remember: the house always wins, especially when the house is Finance.

🧠 Mentalist
Run a game called Guess Your Bonus. They’ll think you’re reading minds – you’re really just reading the budget spreadsheet. Also, try a little hypnosis and they’ll swear tap water tastes like Moët.

Got a problem you wouldn’t trust the Comms Dr to fix? Reply to this email, I’ll loop in real experts. 

What The Fluff (WTF)?! – Decoding tech, something that linguists, philosophers, and your boss refuse to do

Layer 8 Insights – Regular deep dives that explore the human error in tech.