Solved: Silly Freelancer Profiles

jmlaidlaw · ‎06-03-2018

A few minutes ago, I was searching for a freelancer by name. This was a freelancer who had posted on the forums yesterday and who was, at that time, making some rather risible claims. I was curious to see whether her profile was still active.

This search took me to eleven pages of freelancers whose profiles were "hits" when I searched for this specific name. It was remarkable how many of these freelancers had earned ZERO. However, what amused and befuddled me even more were these entries:

The two freelancers whose asking rates are $500. Each seems to offer no particularly special skills or services. In fact, one of them describes her services in three choppy sentence fragments, and claims to be a skilled translator into English, although her sentence fragments more or less say: "me speak real good english."

The freelancer whose first line included this: "I am 16 years old." (!!!!!!!!!!)

The freelancer whose first line or two includes the information that she is a high-school student. (Oh, by the way... She also charges $500 an hour. For video editing or some such.) Just in case you're wondering if she's a late bloomer, I'm guessing not. Her photo looks as if it is, indeed, that of a high-school student.

The generous supply of English-language "proofreaders" whose command of English is tenuous, at best.

Need to prune the dead branches, Upwork? I found plenty of obvious dead weight, and I wasn't even looking for it!

reinierb · ‎06-03-2018

@Janean, given Upwork's reliance on us to report scammy, suspect, or downright fraudulent profiles, there must be thousands of similarly silly, and/or ridiculous profiles. Just think how many of these could have been found and removed in the time they took to accuse you of cheating.

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reinierb · ‎06-03-2018

@Janean, given Upwork's reliance on us to report scammy, suspect, or downright fraudulent profiles, there must be thousands of similarly silly, and/or ridiculous profiles. Just think how many of these could have been found and removed in the time they took to accuse you of cheating.

luce-neidert · ‎06-03-2018

@Janean L wrote:

Need to prune the dead branches, Upwork? I found plenty of obvious dead weight, and I wasn't even looking for it!

I agree with you, Janean. Whenever I have the opportunity to wander around the freelancers' profiles, I feel as if I were wandering in a cemetery, with all those profiles that have been around for years and have never earned a single dollar.

I do wish there were less inactive profiles around, it doesn't make Upwork look good to have so many inactive profiles to offer potential clients.

petra_r · ‎06-04-2018

Funny thing is that those profiles come up in searches at all, considering that allegedly profiles are set to private after 30 or 50 days of not earnings, yet those zombie profiles still linger.

versailles · ‎06-04-2018

@Petra R wrote:
Funny thing is that those profiles come up in searches at all, considering that allegedly profiles are set to private after 30 or 50 days of not earnings, yet those zombie profiles still linger.

That's an interesting observation indeed.

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"Where darkness shines like dazzling light" —William Ashbless

madison-russell · ‎06-04-2018

Now I'm curious. What is Upwork's age requirement? I assume it's 18, but I've never actually bothered to look. Wouldn't someone be kicked off for putting the age 16 in their profile?

jmlaidlaw · ‎06-04-2018

@ Madison: Quote: "Wouldn't someone be kicked off for putting the age 16 in their profile?"

Well, Madison, that's exactly the point. Yes, indeed, 16 is below Upwork's age requirement/limit. You would think that a profile that says, overtly, outright, in effect: "I am too young to be working on this platform; I am violating the platform's rules" would never have been approved... right?

But, then, there are many, many freelancers whose profiles should never have been approved... And yet, there they are, these silly profiles: in all their self-evident mendacity and/or incompetence and/or chicanery... and there, indeed, some of them stay.

(In fact, the freelancer for whose profile I had been searching had been overtly advertising her desire to apply her experience and skills "about writing student work or academic papers." You would have thought that such an overt and brazen statement, which says, in effect, "I am eager to collude in academic fraud," would also have been a basis for her profile to be rejected from the git-go. But, no.) (To Upwork's credit, I could not locate her profile when I checked for it later on, so I believe that she may actually have been booted once she was foolish enough to call attention to herself.)

petra_r · ‎06-04-2018

The age thing apparently changed with the new terms of service.

I am too lazy to find it though.

tlbp · ‎06-04-2018

If and when Upwork actually gets serious about an IPO, investors will begin reviewing those profiles to verify the numbers Upwork claims re: freelancers and clients. I would expect Upwork to do some serious pruning once that happens. Nothing like an outside audit to shake out the cobwebs.

madison-russell · ‎06-04-2018

Alright so I actually read through the updated TOS and you must be 18 or of the legal age to "conduct business" in your country. Basically, you must be able to sign documents legally. So I guess an emancipated minor would be able to sign up, but generally you must be 18.

wendy_writes · ‎06-05-2018

Tonya, I hope you are right. Taking rigorous action only makes good business sense ....

(and that makes me wonder about the possibilities -)

mcluc · ‎06-06-2018

Well, when you get bored on a particular day (especially when it rains or snowing seriously) and don't know what to do with your free time, take all the freelancer that are in the same domain of you, set the earnings to zero or maximum rate on the search result and then go have some fun; I think so (related to the 'fun' term). There, a very easy way for Upwork employees / staff to clean up profiles.

There are somewhere between 70-80 freelancers just from my own city that have zero earnings and only 10-15 who have good earnings. I'm not even sure when was the last time they logged in.

versailles · ‎06-06-2018

@Tonya P wrote:
If and when Upwork actually gets serious about an IPO, investors will begin reviewing those profiles to verify the numbers Upwork claims re: freelancers and clients. I would expect Upwork to do some serious pruning once that happens. Nothing like an outside audit to shake out the cobwebs.

Do you think so? They may want to do the exact opposite actually. Stock buyers and analysts may easily confuse a big listing with the promise of great future business figures.

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"Where darkness shines like dazzling light" —William Ashbless

prestonhunter · ‎06-06-2018

Upwork has gone to considerable effort to add new functionality that automatically sets freelancer profiles to private if they are inactive... I believe the criteria is if the freelancer is not earning anything in the past month.

This means that these freelancers do not show up in searches done by the clients.

Presumably these freelancers are not being included in the automatic lists of suggested freelancers displayed when clients create a new job.

The private-profile freelancers don't show in browsable lists of freelancers in various skill categories.

So at that point... what is the harm in retaining the freelancers? I don't know that there is any kind of appreciable cost or penalty?

If one fo these freelancers decides to become active, their account is ready for them to do so.

luce-neidert · ‎06-07-2018

@Preston H wrote:
Upwork has gone to considerable effort to add new functionality that automatically sets freelancer profiles to private if they are inactive... I believe the criteria is if the freelancer is not earning anything in the past month.

This means that these freelancers do not show up in searches done by the clients.

I just hope they don't, because it makes Upwork look terrible!

petra_r · ‎06-07-2018

@Preston H wrote:
Upwork has gone to considerable effort to add new functionality that automatically sets freelancer profiles to private if they are inactive... I believe the criteria is if the freelancer is not earning anything in the past month.

This means that these freelancers do not show up in searches done by the clients.

Not quite, there are ENDLESS ones that have not set private despite having no earnings for absolutely ages, and still show.

You can replicate that by running searches.

wendy_writes · ‎06-07-2018

Thanks, Petra. I've been trying to find a polite way of conveying this to Preston - you did it for me. Far more kindly than I ...

prestonhunter · ‎06-07-2018

re: "...there are ENDLESS ones that have not set private despite having no earnings for absolutely ages, and still show."

Then there are only two possibilities:

Either I misunderstand Upwork's stated intentions for this functionality.

[or]

Upwork's execution of this concept is seriously flawed.

Any place that genuinely inactive freelancers are presented to clients (whether in suggested freelancer lists, search results, or browse pages) is a disservice to the freelancers who are actually active and interested in work...

...and it is an even bigger disservice to clients.

The client experience can only be diminished if search results are cluttered with inactive freelancers... freelancers who aren't even using the platform and won't respond in any way if the client sends an invitation.

versailles · ‎06-07-2018

I have an open job. If I want to invite people besides the ones who have already applied, Upwork presents me with a list of (a lot of) freelancers.

None of them has zero earnings and none has a JSS < 80%.

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"Where darkness shines like dazzling light" —William Ashbless

pandoraharper · ‎06-07-2018

Search results showing profiles of freelancers who are more then a year old, have never earned a dime, or haven't earned in months - Should be private, and therefore not show up in search results. Let's call these Zombie profiles (I know someone else did this in the thread, whoever you are, Kudos!).

Based on the amount of searches I've done this year alone, I would guess there are a SCARY amount of these profiles. It's beyond stupid, and I pity the poor, new client who is recommended not 1 or 2, but SEVERAL of these zombie profiles as Recommendations.

Why are these profiles still here?

mcluc · ‎06-07-2018

The ugly truth is that I did wrote on this topic for the same reasons as everyone did, to improve the system. Got two kudos for the idea while my profile however is set to private. Not that I don't want to work here no more or took a brake, but I got private because I'm appling to jobs daily, but no one wanted to work with me since my last job. Ha-ha; oh gosh, "i'm crying", not sure why I'm laughing. 😞

Ideal will be for the members / users who haven't logged in at all, on any device after months of inactivity to be put on hold, but continue letting those who still apply to be left public and visible if I am one of them right now. After all, Upwork has a huge market of freelancers and it is hard to get a job of multiple reasons. Therefore not all of them are "zombies".

While writing the last sentence, another idea came in mind, that Upwork should come with the option where it could show at freelancer profile when was the last time he did logged in. Simple. In that way the clients will know, and the staff will know what measure to take.

ravi_iitian · ‎06-07-2018

If you’re a client that has been presented with “zombies,” you can notify Upwork.

As a freelancer, I don’t give two hoots about “zombies.”

"Certa bonum certamen"

wendy_writes · ‎06-07-2018

Taking us back to what I suspect (or at least hope) will be the prime driver in correcting this mess - as Tonya wrote:

"If and when Upwork actually gets serious about an IPO, investors will begin reviewing those profiles to verify the numbers Upwork claims re: freelancers and clients. I would expect Upwork to do some serious pruning once that happens. Nothing like an outside audit to shake out the cobwebs.".

Stringent audits prevail in the world of acquiring investors and any attempt to go public. False figures and dishonest data do not bode well for enticing outside money.

We can hope ...