The Shortage of Real People

Blogging Outside Format. A Manifesto, Post #1/14

Where it starts

I almost quit. Almost. But sometimes, with nothing better to do — standing in line, sitting on the toilet, at three in the morning — I open LinkedIn. Or Instagram. And thirty seconds later I want to throw up rainbows.

What actually pisses me off about the feed

AI avatars that look like everyone and no one. Horrifying lip sync, unnatural movements, stress on the wrong syllables. Guys, at least use ElevenLabs, pay the extra — you're not just lazy, you're cheap. Posts about leadership from people who've never led anything. Reels with the same dance, the same opinion, the same "I've been thinking." Except you weren't thinking. A prompt thought for you. And then the flood of enthusiastic declarative sentences — no facts, no doubt, as if only one version of reality exists. Same-same hype garbage, zero fact-checking.

The metaphor that stuck

AI slop is the new plastic. We're polluting the internet the same way we're choking the planet.

Where I stand on this

I love AI. It's my tool, my editor, my translator. But when there's no brain behind the prompt — no actual opinion, just generation — that's not a tool anymore. That's a prosthetic where a healthy leg used to be.

Why I stopped posting on LinkedIn

I used to post on LinkedIn. Then I stopped. No hard feelings — I just ran out of time. I'd find a topic, dig into it, work it out, share it. Not building an audience, not gunning for influencer status — I genuinely enjoyed the process. Then I got a job. Time is a resource. The question isn't whether to stop yelling into a dumpster. The question is what to spend it on instead. I chose my own blog. The one nobody reads. Yet.

On the scale of AI text

By 2025, more than half of new articles online weren't written by humans. Three quarters of new web pages contain AI-generated text. This isn't a vibe. It's been counted, measured, published. But you don't need the stats. You can already see it: you open the feed, read a paragraph, everything's correct, everything's polished — and nothing lands. Like talking to someone who smiles, nods, and doesn't hear a single word.

The shortage of the real

Right now there's a serious shortage of real people with actual thoughts. Against the backdrop of AI slop, hype cycles, recycled media, and Telegram content farms — a real human behind a text has become rare. There used to be fewer texts, and each one meant something. Now there are endless texts, and none of them mean anything.

How we make "content"

There's a guy. He wrote a post about authenticity. The post had a Wednesday slot in the content calendar. There's a woman. She filmed a reel — "just be yourself" — with a ring light, a teleprompter, and three takes. There's me. I wrote "I write for myself." Then I checked the analytics. We're all lying. The only difference is who notices.

Why people stop reading

62% of people stop reading when they suspect the text was written by a machine. Not because it's bad — it can be technically flawless. But because there's nobody behind it. You feel the emptiness the way you feel a draft — you can't see it, but you know a door is open somewhere.

About me

I don't think I'm anything special. Not some aristocrat — grew up poor, been working since I was fourteen. But I write honestly, in my own words, not from someone else's prompts. Maybe that'll matter to someone. Or maybe this is all my delusion. I don't know. I genuinely don't know.

What I do know

But here's what I know: a personal blog is a diary without a lock. You don't need the lock, because honesty is the one thing that can't be generated.

About this text

This is, in some ways, a manifesto. Not as grand as Malevich's, but it's mine. Honest. Maybe too honest. I've never written like this before. I was scared of Instagram moderation, of getting blocked, of "what if they take it the wrong way." Maybe I shouldn't be saying half of this here either. I don't know. Right now — this is how it is. Later I'll change. I'm human and I change. But right now I want to rip the mask off. At least try.

Is it too late to start a blog?

Is it too late to start a blog? Too late — if you're waiting for an empty field where one post gets you a thousand followers. That field doesn't exist anymore. It's been buried under machine-generated text. But if something is burning in your chest — right now is the best time to start. The internet is drowning in AI slop, and that's exactly why a real voice has become scarce. AI slop can't feel. It simulates feeling — but people see through it. They choose the raw, shot-on-a-phone, said-while-stuttering. Because the stutter has a person in it. The polished reel doesn't.

Blogging in 2026

Blogging in 2026 isn't for people chasing 10x growth. It's a slow, grinding climb uphill. At the end of the month, nobody pays you, even though you worked like a dog. Your readers? Nobody, really — some strangers, and Masha. Masha is the one person who responded when I wrote a piece about friends who became parents.

Why I keep going

And I keep going. Not because it's an "authenticity strategy." Not because "a real voice is a scarce resource" — even though it's true. But because I have something to say. Because it burns. Because when half the internet is machine text, the only way to not drown in it is to be what a machine can't: yourself.

Caveats and the end

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe in a year I'll shut the blog down and go make reels with an AI avatar. Maybe Masha will stop reading. Maybe this is all an illusion. But an illusion with a real person behind it — that's more interesting to me than a truth with nobody behind it at all.