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 - Use ‘future ready’ if you want to impress

• Shallow Values - Diversity: It’s important to champion inclusivity

• Savage Takedowns - Deel: James Bond espionage or daylight robbery

• Pop Culture Cringe - JFK Jr.: Prince or just a dumb, good looking dude

• LinkedIn Templates - An introvert finds their extrovert and shines

• Dear Dr Comms - The experts show you how to shut up a talkative boss

• WTF does Bit Rot mean? Apparently it’s not flesh-eating zombies

Already subscribed? Excellent. If not, subscribe below. It’s your antidote to boring meetings filled with circular conversations and strategic vagueness.

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

Original Fluff: Future Ready
Our solution empowers organisations to become future-ready enterprises, equipped with the agility, resilience, and innovation capacity needed to thrive in an evolving digital landscape.

Translated:
“Future-ready” = you’ll need another upgrade next year.
“Agility” = faster pivots to whatever’s trending.
“Resilience” = absorbing the cost of our outages.
“Innovation capacity” = more licences, more training, more cash.
“Evolving digital landscape” = the chaos we helped create.

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

DIVERSITY

Champions of Diversity
“Two years ago we launched our diversity strategy: 50/50 men and women and 30% more employees with cognitive cohesion. Nothing’s changed, but the strategy has been widely circulated and is highly respected.”

Diverse Voices Matter
“We hosted a panel, heard hundreds of different perspectives, then resumed doing what the ($450 an hour) strategy consultants told us.”

Inclusion at Every Level
“We’re proudly inclusive: oat and almond milk for the dairy averse, cow’s milk for the unevolved, soy crackers for gluten intolerants, a meat platter for carnivores, and bone broth for paleo purists.”

Savage Takedowns – Spectator sport or heed the lesson

Deel: From HR Tech to ‘James Bond’ Espionage
In March 2025, HR‑tech unicorn Deel was accused by rival Rippling of orchestrating corporate espionage by recruiting a payroll manager as a mole and funnelling trade secrets back to leadership by crypto. The mole even attempted a bathroom escape with his phone. The amended complaint calls Deel a ‘criminal syndicate’ under RICO.

Why it matters:
If your company has IP worth stealing, assume someone’s already plotting it over lattes. Be careful who you trust, what access you hand out, and who suddenly volunteers for “extra admin rights.” And if you’re thinking of stealing IP, get prepared to win nothing but a ruined reputation, legal drama. and maybe, just maybe, criminal charges.

Pop Culture Cringe – Out of touch comms worth your time

John F. Kennedy Jr.: The Myth of Prince, The Reality of a Dunderhead
CNN’s new docuseries American Prince: JFK Jr. (2025) tries to mythologise JFK Jr. as a visionary publisher of George. The truth? He barely ran the operation - and was in fact an entitled beefcake, womaniser, and a dangerously reckless individual who coasted on his looks. Like many privileged children, he got away with it. Journalist Maureen Callahan skewers the fantasy on The Nerve, calling him “dumb,” “not smart, did not have an original mind… shades of Meghan Markle - just a hot guy looking for a good time.”

In B2B tech, this is the equivalent of mythologising Apple, Google, or any tech giant through glossy PR and founder folklore, while ignoring the harsher realities of missteps, failures, and flawed leadership.

Lesson?
The above docuseries shows that humans love icons. We pin our hopes on Marley the rebel, Che the revolutionary, JFK Jr. the American Prince. But icons are tidy myths - we invent them because the messy, flawed human underneath is harder to accept. Admire the symbol if you insist, just don’t mistake it for the truth.

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

Template 11: The ‘Introvert in the Spotlight’ Post

Today’s post isn’t just vulnerable. It’s brave.

As a lifelong introvert, nothing terrifies me more than putting myself out there, especially on LinkedIn, where headshots are currency and humble-brags are gospel - but, that’s just not me...

Yet here I am: full-sized photo, chin slightly tilted, caption about “stepping into my power.”

🪞 To the courage it takes to share a perfectly lit portrait.
🪞 To the struggle of typing this between a spin class and a podcast cameo.
🪞 To the authenticity of admitting my fears… while tracking engagement.

I didn’t just post. I transformed.

#IntrovertNoMore #VulnerabilityIsMyBrand #InfluenceThroughInsecurity

Copy and paste with a photo that screams headshot, but I’m authentic and self aware.

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

My boss doesn’t shut up. Ever. He paces while monologuing, talks over me when I try to contribute, and seems physically incapable of silence. Meetings feel like cardio with commentary, and I leave more exhausted than enlightened. How do I get him to stop? Yours, Slowly Losing the Will to Listen

Dear Losing,

Sounds like you’re trapped in a one-man show no one bought tickets to. Let’s see how the pros would fix it:

🚸 School Crossing Guard:
“Hold up the stop sign. Enforce pauses. Everyone gets their turn to cross (and speak). If the boss ignores it, blow the whistle - structure only works when rules are visible.”

🕴️Hostage Negotiator:
“Treat every meeting like a standoff. Keep your tone calm, repeat key demands, and never let him see you sweat. Slip in: ‘I hear you, but here’s what we need now.’ You’re not adding comments - you’re buying your freedom, one sentence at a time.”

🚀 Space Scientist:
“Your boss is basically cosmic background noise: loud, constant, and utterly useless for navigation. The fix? Introduce mission control, i.e., structured Agendas. They act like gravity - pulling him back to orbit. Without them, you’re just stuck listening to interstellar static until the oxygen runs out.”

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.