LinkedIn Retires Community Top Voice Badges for Contributors of Collaborative Articles

LinkedIn / Community Top Voice

LinkedIn is retiring its Community Top Voice badges—gold badges awarded to users who frequently contributed to Collaborative Articles. Unlike the invite-only, manually selected Top Voice badges (blue), these were automatically granted based on participation levels.

For current Top Community Voice badge holders, the badges will expire 60 days after being awarded, with all badges phased out by December 7, 2024.

Why It Matters: Although these badges were intended to encourage engagement, their automatic distribution—regardless of contribution quality—led to oversaturation, diminishing their value and effectively turning them into participation trophies.

With the badges being eliminated, it will be interesting to see whether participation in Collaborative Articles declines, as the badges seemed to incentivize some users to respond to the AI-powered prompts. Additionally, with LinkedIn recently opting all users into allowing the platform to train on its data, some have speculated that Collaborative Articles were a data play from the beginning, which may already be deterring some users from engaging with the feature.

LinkedIn / Training Content Creation AI Models Toggle

LinkedIn isn’t alone in utilizing gamified incentivization systems; other platforms, like TikTok, employ similar approaches to encourage specific actions for AR Effects. While these rewards can foster engagement, platforms must strike a balance between making them meaningful and avoiding oversaturation.

Share your thoughts and see how others are reacting to the removal of the badges in the comments of this post here.