Is LinkedIn Moving In MySpace Direction?
06/07/2007, 1 year 2 months ago
So LinkedIn won Webby awards in two categories (Social Networks and Services). I can definitely say I'm happy about it, it is a well-deserved victory, especially when it comes to ‘Services' category, I think. LinkedIn is really a great service and I certainly use it more than any other of nominees in the category. I guess it was hard to choose between nominated social networks since they are so terribly different (StumbleUpon, Digg, Facebook, Vox) in their purposes. But still I don't think there's any doubt LinkedIn is the best professional social network.
But I'm not writing just to congratulate my own ultimate destination for professional networking. I'm writing actually about the contest they held for their ‘Services' award acceptance speech. Webby awards are famous for their traditional five-words acceptance speeches. And LinkedIn invited the community to offer versions of the speeches for LinkedIn and the winner was to accept the award at the ceremony.
They received over 400 suggestions (I'm too lazy to browse through all of them, honestly). So they chose the best speech suggested by software executive and entrepreneur David Multer which sounded too simple for my taste ("Thanks for the endorsement!") and had the exclamation mark instead of the fifth word (I know brevity is the soul of wit but still). I did like several of the other versions better, though I admit some of them were totally stupid or inappropriate. But I do not intend to dispute the choice anyway (by the way, I did not suggest any version myself so I am not jealous because of not being selected as a winner).
But the thing is that LinkedIn actually had space for two speeches and only one of them was crafted by the LinkedIn community. The second one (in the ‘Social Networking' category) was delivered by Kay Luo, LinkedIn Director of Corporate Communications. And that speech was something I could have expected to hear from MySpace of Facebook but definitely not from LinkedIn. It was "Come connect with me tonight". Can anyone here explain to me what "tonight" means in this short phrase? Is LinkedIn not about business that is mostly done at daylight? Does not it sound too frivolous for a social network that is only and strictly intended for professional communications? Do I get it right that we will soon see some teenagers on LinkedIn meeting for a chat "tonight"? Or am I paranoid?
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Hi Svetlana,
Glad you get value out of LinkedIn! To answer your question, the “tonight” was referring to the audience at the Webby Awards ceremony. There were so many great people from amazing companies at the Webby Awards who I was hoping to connect with and get to know. Sure enough, many of them came up to me afterwards and introduced themselves (the “In” logo on my dress definitely helped). Here’s one of my favorite connections from the night: http://www.nothingbutnets.org. For $10, you can buy a mosquito net and save a child from Malaria. I’m hoping to sign them up for LinkedIn for Good (www.linkedin.com/good)!
Cheers,
-Kay
Honestly I haven’t been too happy with LinkedIn since they killed the LinkedIn Fast buttons that actually helped me network with people.
Whilst I have spent some time on their Answers, that is also a second rate discussion system where people have to work around the limitations.
In many ways the “networking” for LinkedIn happens off the site, which is in my mind not very useful.
Kay,
Sure, LinkedIn is very valuable to me because I don’t think there is another social network where all my professional contacts are presented. I find great people there. In fact, I found one of our authors, Cyndy, asking my network if they knew someone for this position.
I just could not think it was a speech for just one night, the night of the ceremony itself, I somehow thought that it presumed some kind of a “mission statement”. Well, I was clearly wrong.
And thank you very much for your explanation though it does make it clear I’m paranoid
And I guess if you dig deep enough you can find enormous amounts of treasures on LI, not only nothingbutnets (BTW, we have already reported on LinkedIn for Good at http://profy.com/2007/05/24/linkedin-launches-philanthropic-channel-for-nonprofits/ and this initiative seems to be the one we should all admire).
Thank you very much for your comment, I really appreciate your attention.
Andy: Well, when there are so many people you need to find (and it looks like everyone I need to solve this or that issue) in only one social network, you will find the way to “work around the limitations” and get accustomed to this way. Maybe it is not enjoyable but LinkedIn’s main advantage is first of all the number of professional profiles it has. What I need is people and I can usually find them easily (and I really think the LI toolbar for Outlook can help immensely), the only exception is Digg’s Kevin Rose who never replied any of the messages I sent his way via LI, other networks and direct emailing
So yes, some people are impossible to get into your network but in this event you won’t find them anywhere else.
Best,
Svetlana
Just notice some missing words in your article.
Can anyone here explain (TO) me what “tonight” means in this short phrase? Is LinedIn (LinkedIn) not about business that is mostly done at daylight? Does not it sound too frivolous for a social network that is only and strictly intended for professional communications?
hth
peace, ryan
Ryan, thank you very much for correcting me. The LinedIn is because LinkedIn is not in a spell checker and thus it is always underlined with red so I did not expect any mistakes. As for the explain to thing, not being a native English speaker I often make strange mistakes because of parallels with my native Russian language - though I’m trying to improve the situation.
But you have a brilliant attention, thanks again, I’ve corrected these mistakes in the post.