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, we take aim at claims of ‘Sustainability’ in:

• Tech Waffle Torture - The “we’re devoted to sustainability” spin

• Shallow Values - Faking our way to ‘sustainability in action’

• Savage Takedowns - Prosecutors accuse tech giants of greenwashing

• Pop Culture Cringe - Nicole Kidman’s marriage no longer sustainable

• LinkedIn Templates - The long-term career humblebrag

• Dear Dr Comms - Unlikely professionals fix a ‘green spin’ disaster

• WTF does climate positive mean?

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

Original Fluff: Governance & Commitment to Sustainability
“With sustainability embedded in our governance model, we strive to protect the planet and are committed to advancing humankind toward a greener, fairer world for generations to come.”

Translated:
Nothing says ‘sustainability’ like charging seven figures to audit your recycling bins while our consulting partners rack up frequent-flyer points to Davos.

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

 Sustainability in Action

Sustainable People
“Our employees recycle their coffee cups religiously, then board flights that undo it in under ten minutes.”

Sustainable Practices
“We proudly switch off monitors at night, while our data centres guzzle enough energy to light a small city.”

Sustainable Future
“We publish net-zero roadmaps and host green summits, while quietly profiting from projects built on sacred Indigenous lands.”

Savage Takedowns – Spectator sport or heed the lesson

Powered By Green: Just Another Mirage
Recently, US state prosecutors publicly accused Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft of “‘environmental accounting gimmicks’ to say they’re powered by renewables.” Their grid energy use, REC purchases, and emission offsets don’t square up with the scale of operations they publicly tout. The data suggests “they’re emitting 7.623 times more greenhouses gases than they are admitting to.”

Spectator Sport
Ah, the theater of virtue: tech giants wave carbon-neutral banners while servers hum like jet engines. Applause fades the moment someone checks the power bill.

Heed the Lesson
If you claim to be green and aren’t, you torch the very thing you need most: trust. Don’t say you’re sustainable if you can’t back it up.

Pop Culture Cringe – Out of touch comms worth your time

From ‘Sustainable’ Marriage to Staged Red-Carpet Acts
Last week, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban announced their separation after 19 years of marriage. The Internet went wild noting the couple had appeared together at public events, projecting harmony and longevity as their marriage quietly unravelled.

Once the divorce papers landed, the façade cracked: stories of Urban’s affairs including with his guitarist, surfaced, alongside whispers about Kidman’s closeness to a personal trainer. The carefully crafted ‘sustainable marriage’ brand collapsed overnight.

In tech, it’s like a company that keeps hosting ‘sustainability’ launches while quietly funding fossil fuel projects behind the scenes.

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

Template 18: The Career Sustainability Humblebrag

People ask how I keep my career thriving year after year. 🌱

• I recycle my old ideas into ‘fresh’ keynotes. ♻️
• I offset burnout by outsourcing the hard stuff. 🌍
• I compost failures into inspirational LinkedIn posts. 🌸
• I plant seeds in every conversation - mostly about me. 🌳

Sustainability is about more than just saving the planet. That’s table stakes. It’s about me lasting forever. 🚀

#CareerLongevity #GreenLeader #SustainableSuccess #LinkedInfluencer

Copy and paste if your growth is renewable but your humility isn’t. 🌍

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’ve just been exposed for greenwashing, exaggerating our low emissions numbers, and are now being roasted in the press. Government spokespeople are even calling us out in parliament, threatening to fine us millions as a public example. How do I fix this and make the problem go away? Yours, Smoked Out

Dear Smoked,

Before your green spin turns into a full-blown toxic cloud, let’s call in some unlikely specialists:

🍼 Baby Sitter
Stakeholders and politicians are cranky toddlers right now - loud, irrational, and spoiling for attention. You won’t win by shouting back. Calm the room, set boundaries, and prove you’re responsible enough to be trusted with the house keys again.

💄 Make-Up Artist
You can’t erase the scars, but you can stop the bleeding from looking worse. Strip off the caked-on ‘carbon neutral’ gloss, apply a lighter, more natural shade of honesty, and step back into the lights without the mask.

🚚 Tow Truck Driver
When your story’s crashed, you don’t try to drive it further - you hook it up, haul it out, and get the mess off the road pronto. Then buy a new ride, rebuild your reputation, and stick to the rules if you want to stay on the road.

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.