LinkedIn can bite my firm yet supple white ass.

[Lightnin]

So here I am at work, desperately avoiding said work.

“Self,” thinks I, “Remember that guy I used to know? Good guy, hung out with him a lot, ended up being my Best Man? Then I lost track of him. I should see if I can use The Power of the Internet to find him.”

So I did a few searches on his name. Eventually, I found him- Oh, frabjuous day, he’s got a profile at LinkedIn! At least I think it’s him- what the heck, I’ll sign up with their service and see if it’s really him (since they don’t let you see the full profile 'til you do so- and it’s free to do so). Can’t wait to talk to him again!

So yours truly signed up. And what do you know- it really IS him! Yay! Now… how I do I send him an email? Oh, there it is- one little click and…

Hmm… it says I can’t send him a message until I upgrade my account. Hmm… but all I want to do is send him a message. I’ve already got email. I’m betting he does, as well… surely there’s an option where I don’t have to pay money to contact him, right?

Nope. sigh

Oh, look! I can add him as a “connection”! That’ll work- at least he’ll get the notification that I’m trying to contact him, right?

Hmm… apparently, to add him as a connection, I have to put in his email address. Which, of course, I don’t have, since I’m trying to find his contact info. :smack:

So here’s pitting YOU, LinkedIn. You tout yourself as a way for friends and contacts to stay in, well, contact. But you’re holding my friend’s email/contact info hostage until I give you money. SCREW YOU. Frankly, I don’t see how you can stay in business- everything you do, a personal website does ten times better. I just wish my friends who like to use you would realize that. Instead of facilitating contact between friends, you’re making it more difficult- and charging people for something the internet already does.

You are a remora on the internet’s ass, LinkedIn.

[Phlosphr]

@Lightnin'

<snip>
You are a remora on the internet’s ass, LinkedIn.

Nice.

This and your title, it seems you have ‘ass’ on the brain.

Calm down and do a different search in the morning.

[Contrapuntal]

No way to extract a phone number from the info you got?

[Lightnin]

I might be able to call the (rather large) company that he now works for (assuming he still works there, of course- who knows how old that info it) and see if they’ll give me his office number… or at least send him a message. However, he seems to be fairly high up in management, so I can see it being unlikely that they’ll want to do so.

Also, he’ll be hard to look up in the phone book. He’s got a fairly common Mexican name, and he’s currently living in L.A.

[ENugent]

@Lightnin'

Also, he’ll be hard to look up in the phone book. He’s got a fairly common Mexican name, and he’s currently living in L.A.

I tried to look up a former boyfriend once, and discovered that he had become one of the original Wizards of the Coast. For obvious reasons, he has done an impeccable job of keeping his contact info off the internet. Maybe I could find him through Hasbro, but given his stature there, I doubt the message would be passed on.

He may well be living in my neighborhood, but I’ll probably never know.

[zagloba]

What was it about LInkedIn’s advertising that led you to believe it was being run as a nonprofit public service?

[Queuing]

What I don’t get is you calling this service crappy and a “remora on the internet’s ass” (for that I thank you as I had no idea what a remora was) as well as “instead of facilitating contact between friends, you’re making it more difficult- and charging people for something the internet already does.”.

It seems to me it would be facilitating contact, and it did make it easy to find, not more difficult. It enabled you to find someone you otherwise have not found. And this makes it pitworthy? All because it wants you to give it some money for a service well done? Huh?

[Critical1]

@ENugent

I tried to look up a former boyfriend once, and discovered that he had become one of the original Wizards of the Coast. For obvious reasons, he has done an impeccable job of keeping his contact info off the internet. Maybe I could find him through Hasbro, but given his stature there, I doubt the message would be passed on.

He may well be living in my neighborhood, but I’ll probably never know.

shoot me his name I may be able to pass along that message…I suppose I would need yours as well.

I dont work for the WOTC crew but I do know several peeps who do.

[Lightnin]

@zagloba

What was it about LInkedIn’s advertising that led you to believe it was being run as a nonprofit public service?

@Queuing

It enabled you to find someone you otherwise have not found. And this makes it pitworthy? All because it wants you to give it some money for a service well done? Huh?

sigh

Because to get all of my friend’s info (and make sure it was actually him), I had to sign up with the service and make a profile. It wasn’t until after I’d done so that I found that there’s no way to contact him… unless I’m willing to sign up for a higher, paid, level of service. The first level is effectively useless. If they’d said right from the beginning that I couldn’t contact him unless I paid them money, I wouldn’t have been so irritated. It’s effectively bait-and-switch.

Even so much as the ability to send a quick “Hi” would be sufficient- but there’s no way to even let him know that I’ve got a profile on there unless I’m willing to pay LinkedIn some money. That is what I’m pitting.

I guess another thing that bothered me about it was that I found his profile through Google. “Hey, here’s your friend (maybe, sign up with us to make sure)! Now give us money so you can say Hi.”

[CaveMike]

I thought you get a few free invites when you sign up? So that you can access a few people, but you have to pay to access more. Or maybe they don’t give the invites out right away?

Anyway, here is the solution to your problem: From his profile, determine the exact name of the company he works for. Modify your profile to indicate that you too work at that company. Then do a Colleague search for that company and he will show up on the list. Invite him from the list. Once you get connected, clean-up the company from your profile.

Aside from that, I don’t really agree with your bait-and-switch thesis.

[Queuing]

Not really buying this. Why would a company ask you to pay for a service before you found out if it was useful to you? LinkedIn seems to allow you to found out that yes this is a useful service, see what I (I being LinkedIn) can do? Now that you know I am useful, as I let you find that our for free, please pay to use me.

[grayhairedmomma]

@Lightnin'

I might be able to call the (rather large) company that he now works for (assuming he still works there, of course- who knows how old that info it) and see if they’ll give me his office number… or at least send him a message. However, he seems to be fairly high up in management, so I can see it being unlikely that they’ll want to do so.

Also, he’ll be hard to look up in the phone book. He’s got a fairly common Mexican name, and he’s currently living in L.A.

Google the company and find their website. If he’s high enough up there will probably be a short bio or a press release with info about him. That should let you know if it’s definitely him or not.

You could call and ask for his office and you’ll get his assistant. That person will take your information and pass it on to your friend.

[Liberal]

I appreciate your frustration, but I agree with the skeptics. Why would anyone go to all that time and bother to compile the data and host the service without making any money for their investment and labor?

[neutron_star]

@Liberal

I appreciate your frustration, but I agree with the skeptics. Why would anyone go to all that time and bother to compile the data and host the service without making any money for their investment and labor?

Advertising dollars?

I don’t know if you’ve heard of it, but there’s an obscure social networking site called MySpace that seems to have had a modest amount of success with this business model.

I really don’t see how sites like the one in the OP (which I’ve never even heard of - that should be telling right there) can succeed when free services exist that do the exact same thing.

The OP also seems to have a legitimate beef, based on the information contained in LinkedIn’s FAQ (bolding mine):

What do I get with a free basic account?

Linkedin offers free personal accounts with robust features, including the ability to:

    * Build and maintain a trusted professional network of unlimited size
    * Find and **reconnect** with colleagues and classmates
    * Request and provide recommendations
    * Create a professional presence on the web
    * Request up to 5 Introductions at a time
    * Search for and view profiles of other LinkedIn users

[Liberal]

@neutron star

Advertising dollars?

Didn’t see any ads on that site.

The OP also seems to have a legitimate beef, based on the information contained in LinkedIn’s FAQ (bolding mine):

I took the liberty to read their sections on finding and contacting users. It seems to me that the service offers people a way to network together. It isn’t a find-a-friend site in the sense of one that just spits out demographics. Apparently, people register, and they can expose themselves to people in different degrees. In other words, just because you’ve found someone there, doesn’t mean they want to hear from you. Sometimes, it appears, you have to go through Billy, Sue, and Mary to get to John because John trusts Billy, Billy trusts Sue, Sue trusts Mary, and Mary trusts you.

[neutron_star]

I meant that if they did have advertising on the site that they wouldn’t have to charge, and would likely have a larger user base. What’s MySpace up to now? 150 million users or so?

As for the rest of your post… geez. That site sounds like a convoluted mess. I mean, if someone doesn’t want to hear from you, wouldn’t it be easier for all parties concerned if they just ignored your message?

[Liberal]

Maybe. But that’s beside the point, isn’t it? The OP simply misunderstood what the site was about.

[Polycarp]

Lightnin’: For obvious reasons, I don’t want to give the guy’s name any more than you do, but let me ask if his “common Mexican name” is by some chance related to what might happen if you go to draw a circle in the desert and screw up? The rest of the description matches, so I’m making a WAG that it’s a mutual friend.

If so, I can possibly put you in touch – e-mail me if I happen to be right.

[Lightnin]

@Polycarp

Lightnin’: For obvious reasons, I don’t want to give the guy’s name any more than you do, but let me ask if his “common Mexican name” is by some chance related to what might happen if you go to draw a circle in the desert and screw up? The rest of the description matches, so I’m making a WAG that it’s a mutual friend.

If so, I can possibly put you in touch – e-mail me if I happen to be right.

Okay, I’m going to be puzzling that one out for a while. A screwed up circle in the desert? I’m not sure what you’re talking about.

I don’t see any harm in mentioning his last name- while not everywhere, it’s not uncommon. His last name is Alaniz.

[ComeToTheDarkSideWeHaveCookies]

I use LinkedIn professionally, and I have to say that the benefits it offers me more than make up for any of the annoyances. Once you’ve invested the time and effort to build a network, you can be freely (though limitedly) “introduced” to people that you a) don’t know at all, but would like to or b) that you do happen to know, though the email address that they used to register on LinkedIn might not be part of that knowledge.

I’m about to transition jobs across the country, and without LinkedIn, I would probably be kissing goodbye countless professional connections that I have made over the past decade.

Forgot to add that I use the free service.