"A fucking catastrophe," Alex agrees. "LinkedIn Premium Recruiter? Twelve thousand dollars. Know how many qualified candidates we got from it? Zero."
"Zero?"
"Zero. Well, that's not fair. We got forty-seven applicants claiming to be 'senior ML engineers' who couldn't explain backpropagation if their lives depended on it. And I'm pretty sure half of them were bots."
Jian finally looks up, his expression somewhere between exhausted and amused. "Indeed was worse. Their 'Smart Matching' algorithm kept sending us baristas."
"Baristas?"
"Something about 'entropy reduction.' The system apparently decided we were in the refrigeration industry. I got matched with a warehouse manager from San Jose who thought we were hiring for HVAC maintenance."
Alex laughs, a real laugh that breaks the tension. "ZipRecruiter sent me a guy who listed 'AI experience' on his resume. Turns out he meant he once used ChatGPT to write a cover letter."
"The platforms are running scams," Jian says, his voice dropping into that analytical register he uses when he's dissecting a problem. "Think about the incentive structure. They charge per job posting, per click, per message. More 'applicants' means higher engagement metrics, which means they can justify higher fees to employers."
"You're saying they run fake applicant bots?"