Spend 15 minutes and read this 3-page article about Reid Hoffman.  It’s the best read that I’ve seen on the founder of LinkedIn, his history, etc.

If you are interested in the WHY of LinkedIn, you need to learn about the man who was behind it.

A King of Connections is Tech’s Go-To Guy (New York Times)

Seems like a logical progression on the path they’ve been on for the last year+.

What do you think about it?

Reference Link: LinkedIn Launches Company Status Updates [How to Get Started]

Many say they are

Check out this question on LinkedIn Answers: Has anyone else noticed that endorser names on LinkedIn recommendations have disappeared?

This could have been about a dozen different features that have disappeared.

I wonder where LinkedIn is headed – if they keep taking away functionality from free users they will either drive their users to other networks (Facebook and Google+), or they will increase their upgrades and make more money.

Perhaps they’ll accomplish both: make more money from people who use the tool while getting rid of (dare I say?) freeloaders who just use the resources.

It’s an interesting crossroads to be at…!

I saw an interesting title on my LinkedIn Group and clicked over to learn more.   Check out this biting title:

LinkedIn Pulled A Facebook And Messed With Your Info — Here’s How To Fix It

Wow. That is a strong accusation. Facebook has become notorious for screwing (there’s not really a nice way to say what FB does, with regard to our privacy!) users by making all kinds of weird changes to privacy.

So what did they do?  Read the article to see how to OPT OUT… here’s what it is in a nutshell:

LinkedIn has volunteered your name and photograph to be used for advertising if it feels like it wants to use them.

I hadn’t heard of this before, so I followed the simple steps to opt out and found that yes, I indeed am in their list of people who can be used for LinkedIn’s advertising. In a nutshell, you opt out by going into the Settings page, then in this order:

I haven’t seen or heard this anywhere else… maybe all the hype over Google+ is keeping the LinkedIn bloggers busy?

LinkedIn filed to become a public company (IPO -> initial public offering), which means they had to document a lot of stuff they haven’t had to as a private company.

It’s kind of a bare-all document.

You can read the entire thing here, at the SEC website.

You can read some thoughts here, at the Business Insider website (much smaller, just highlights).

Interesting, eh? I’m reading this with different perspectives: one who writes about LinkedIn, and one who owns a business and wants to know what big, funded, successful companies do and think. It’s really cool to see all this stuff (although I’m sure they wish they could keep it under wraps forever :p).

LinkedIn finally announced they have 100 million people who have signed up for their service.

These are not 100M users… but people who have opened an account (less the duplicates, of course).

Congrats to LinkedIn – that is a great milestone!

(check out the cool image at the bottom of this post that shows some neat stats…. two that jumped out at me are (a) less than 45% of signups are in the US, and (b) there are over 20M groups!)

On a LinkedIn Group I saw a message that indicated LinkedIn is reducing free account services (AGAIN)… this time it’s a really big reduction.

I just tested and there is no change for me, but maybe it just isn’t rolled out in my account yet.  I honestly hope this is just a rumor, though.

Here’s what I know:

If you are NOT a first degree contact with someone and you want to communicate with them with a message, you have to upgrade (it says: “Send an InMail”… which sends you to a page to upgrade).

I’ve always been able to join a Group that that person is in, and the “send Inmail” link changes to “Send a message,” with no upgrade prompt.  This has been a great way to communicate with someone quite fast, without upgrade, and without a limit on how many times I can send a message like this (in other words, you only get X inMails a month, or at a time).

If the rumors are true, LinkedIn is changing it so that it will still say “send an inMail.”  Apparently, based on what the person reporting it wrote, you can still send them a message, but you have to go the “long way” to do it… you’d have to go to the Group, find the person, and then click the link to message them from there. That might take me a few minutes to do, which is a pain.

I’m not sure if this is really the direction LinkedIn is headed.  They’ve reduced the free features a number of times over the last while… I’m guessing they’ve done it as they’ve prepared for their IPO (“hey, look at us, we have a lot of people upgrading!”).  I hope it stops, though… if they keep reducing the free features they’ll really prompt people to look at an alternative.  Even an 800 pound guerrilla can’t keep pushing and pushing (and disrespecting) and expect to get away with it.

I’ve heard a lot of backlash about this type of behaviour over the years… on that one Discussion talking about this the comments include:

Yep… it’s like what IT people said Microsoft called their bugs… “features.”

This is a SHAMEFUL statement… it’s a shame that users are saying this disrespectful move is TYPICAL. If I owned or worked at LinkedIn this would be a stinging statement (I can’t defend it!)

I really can’t say more than that… :s

Like I said, I hope the rumors are UNTRUE!

Weird title, I know.  I didn’t know how to appropriately wrap this one up.

Yesterday, right before I had a very important webinar on LinkedIn, I found my LinkedIn account was inaccessible. I had to use Plan C, which is never fun.

I was prompted to do a “forgot password,” but I was very, very, very skeptical of that, wondering if someone, somehow, was going to get access to my account.

I’ve since learned that it is a legitimate thing, pushed from LinkedIn, to protect my account.

Here’s the email they sent me:

This is a great email – they didn’t include any links to click on so I could trust it was okay since they pointed me back to their website (sometimes a link looks good but it goes to LinkedIn.cn or something like that, where people can steal your password, then online identity, and eventually your pet dog).

I did that this morning and all seems to be fine.

Here’s LinkedIn’s post that touches on this.

I used to own LinkedIn Help dot com… but LinkedIn took it away (and let it die).

Here’s the last bit of this history, as I let LinkedIn help dot net go:

It was fun while it lasted …

I’ve been seriously following LinkedIn’s progress for a few years now but recently just learned about Ian McCarthy.  Not sure why it has taken me so long to figure out who he is, since he is the guy who drives the actual product.

I was reading up on the new changes on LinkedIn Groups (what do you think about those changes?) and saw this on TechCrunch:

LinkedIn’s principal product manager Ian McCarthy says that overall, Groups has been upgraded to be more engaging with users and a place where people can have conversations on the platform.

So, it really is Ian who’s behind all this stuff… !  I don’t know what their product management team looks like… but here’s some info about Ian (from his LinkedIn Profile):

• He’s in the San Francisco area (of course)
• He went to Stanford (leaving/graduating in 1991)
• He tweets here (not much, though… 164 followers and 52 tweets)
• Past titles include “VP, Product Marketing” (Orb Networks) and CEO (GoPix – probably funded by LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman)
• His Profile could use some beefing up (check out my DVD!)

I’m not crazy about all the social stuff LinkedIn is doing, but I think they investors think they have to be more like Facebook/Twitter… LI’s value has been, and should be, in other places.  It will be interesting to see where Ian continues to take the features.