Linkedin www.linkedin.com Reviews

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Good Points: Robust, extremely popular, well-presented, an emerging standard of business-level network site

Bad Points: Not convinced about all the user interface features personally, plus it has no "review section". Probably needs more work to pick up on facebook features too.

General comments: Generally, I don't like social network sites. This is the stuff of a new generation, and good luck to them - sitting at a terminal and telling the world what you are doing (which, by definition, is "nothing", if you are at your computer... ).

I do, however, accept and try to exploit the value of professionally-focused network/contact sites. For me, linkedin is probably the best of the bunch. It may not be the longest-running and there are others like Xing that have superior functionality and arguably a neater interface, but it has the best overall functionality and "feel" to it, and the 50 scrillion users it has must indicate something (beyond the fact that its free).

Some key notes are:

- network trawling, search, and invitations to connect are thoughtfully provided, simple to use, and effective

- recommendations, referrals, groups, etc. all provide that sensible niche categorization you need when either trying to look for a job, a candidate, an answer to a question, etc.

- the profile is nicely layed-out, has a sensible set of sections, and is a good way to force you to take your "public image" seriosuly. The PDF copy feature is neat because it effectively helps you build a CV for yourself without thinking.

The rest of the site is much the same as xing, plaxo and a bunch of others, and it is a web based contact management system which allows you to bug your mates by emailing them and asking them to join. Some folk just spend their time collecting names and just "being on the site", whereas others will put it to use, and breathe life into the site by posting Q's and A's etc. Generally, linkedin has a better level of interaction of postings than other sites, and the quality tends to be high (apart from the occasional hijack).

If you are any kind of professional and want to use a portable method of managing contacts and perhaps getting your foot in the door with new folk or opportunities, you could do a lot worse than spend an hour or two on linkedin to build up a decent profile.

Finally, I used to have the site crash on me a lot - they seem to have fixed that now. It's a pretty robust engine, which is encouraging considering the amount of traffic it must get.

Good site, worth joining.

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