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LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

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Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#111

Post by jhandl »

abitsios wrote: post #84
rjf90 wrote: post #66

This is deceptive at best. I've been a fan of LinkedIn as a company until now.

Really? That's something I haven't heard of from a technical person in a very long while (if ever). LinkedIn's public image from the last 2 years: * 2012 hack. 6.5M unsalted SHA1 password hashes leaked [1] * 2013 Acquires Pulse, forces existing users to create a LinkedIn account. Users are pissed [2] * 2013 LinkedIn Intro. In case you missed it, it was an iOS app that changed your mail settings to proxy your incoming…

Why did you create a profile? If you don't want to connect with your professional network, if you don't care who looked at your profile (and are even spooked about it), if you (likely) don't use it to find people... What do you think is the purpose of having a LinkedIn account?

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#112

Post by mpclark »

mrtksn wrote: post #71
mpclark wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm the same -- I never allow websites to riffle through my contacts, and would certainly never give up access to my email account to do it. However, mobile apps have a much easier time of it. Looking at the contacts stored on one's phone is just one of the many permissions they request, and users are conditioned to just click past that screen anyway.

By mobile you mean Android. In IOS, apps needs to explicitly ask the user to access the contacts after installing the app.

Ha, yes, yes I mean Android. I'd heard there was another mobile OS out there, but haven't ever used it.

So I wonder if there's a measurable difference in the Linkedin graphs of iOS and Android users as a result of this? I guess only Linkedin knows...

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#113

Post by ryguytilidie »

grey-area wrote: post #61

This obsession with collecting users (dead or alive) reminds me of Gogol's Dead Souls - companies trading in users (who may or may not exist) in order to boost their standing and taking out huge loans on the basis of their illusory popularity. Even illusory users can have some value, just like the dead serfs in Gogol's tale, and like the dead serfs, their value is not in their existence, but in being entries on a led…

"Since real money is involved and salaries and careers are riding on this number going up, they'll employ all kinds of perverse and intrusive tricks in order to inflate that number every quarter for as long as it is a measure of success."

Isn't this also true for most startups?

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#114

Post by grey-area »

downandout wrote: post #105
grey-area wrote: post #61

This obsession with collecting users (dead or alive) reminds me of Gogol's Dead Souls - companies trading in users (who may or may not exist) in order to boost their standing and taking out huge loans on the basis of their illusory popularity. Even illusory users can have some value, just like the dead serfs in Gogol's tale, and like the dead serfs, their value is not in their existence, but in being entries on a led…

They are not reporting these to investors as accounts. Every time someone that knows someone else hits the connect button, it gives LinkedIn another opportunity to spam that user on their behalf - pummeling them until they sign up. This is an aggressive (though somewhat scummy) growth strategy, not an investment fraud strategy.

It's not important whether they report ghost users as real because they serve their own purpose - to trick people into spamming contacts and trick contacts into signing up, at which point they are counted. Growth is not always good.

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#115

Post by drakaal »

What a load of bull.

Let me tell you a story about John Sculley. Former CEO of Apple ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Sculley )

I met John 4 times. He contributed to a charity that I was working with. I didn't think there was any chance he would remember me. Years went by, then I got a linkedin invite from John wanting to connect.

John Sculley wants to connect with me? Really? This can't be real. I'm "famous" but I'm not that "famous" and I barely met John, no way, has to be fake. So I report it to LinkedIn. A second friend gets a similar invite, and she has never met John, but was a contractor for Apple, and at Pepsi when John was. I have her report it to Linkedin as well.

Linkedin rushes around, calls John, doesn't get anything but a generic voicemail. 72 hours later they remove the account. 4 days later John's wife gets back from a trip, and checks his email and sees that linkedin has removed his account.

Ooops. I have caused a legit person to have their account removed.

I'm not saying LinkedIn users are all "real" but they do seem to go out of their way to have what is described in this article not happen.

- http://www.linkedin.com/in/brandonwirtz

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#116

Post by michaelochurch »

My issue with LinkedIn is philosophical as well as practical: it's fucking dangerous.

In the career game, most of us have to be spies-- careful and immensely tactical with information-- in order to have success. A lucky few are so good at what they can do that they can shoot their mouth off (like I do) and tell the truth, for the good of the world. But most people will need to reinvent their histories at least once, and LinkedIn makes it harder to do that.

The upside: participation in a rather boring social network.

The downside: you can never reinvent yourself, because you've put too much information out there and people can find out that you actually were only a Director, not a VP, at that job in 2007, or that you spent 4 months at a shitty startup you've since taken off your resume.

But now it's almost socially unacceptable not to have a profile and actively play the game (so as to get double-digit endorsement counts in your specialties).

To me, LinkedIn seems to be a way for those in the slave class to polish their own chains.

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#117

Post by prezjordan »

nomadcoop wrote: post #20

I deleted my LinkedIn account last year because I got tired of dealing with spam emails from them and people bugging me to endorse them for skills. I still get emails from LinkedIn telling me someone would like to connect. For a site which is supposed to be about building professional connections I find them horrible to deal with.

Endorsements seem automated to me, and I almost feel like I'm taking crazy pills. Distant cousins endorsing you for Ruby? There's no way they actually clicked that button. I feel like LinkedIn is generating those as well, as a means of getting back on their platform.

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#118

Post by mcv »

mpclark wrote: post #45
SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #12

> "LinkedIn allows you to sign in to your email account and it will scan your contacts..." Hand my contacts list to a website? No thank you. When is letting a website have this a good idea, not just Linkedin, but ever ?

I'm the same -- I never allow websites to riffle through my contacts, and would certainly never give up access to my email account to do it. However, mobile apps have a much easier time of it. Looking at the contacts stored on one's phone is just one of the many permissions they request, and users are conditioned to just click past that screen anyway.

I never would either. Problem is, it's possible I may have accidentally done it in the past, possibly when I was tired and thought it was about something else.

Did I? Can I undo it? No idea. Linkedin is quiet about it, and it looks like it can't be undone.

Re: LinkedIn is not using email contacts to find people who have an account already

#119

Post by nomadcoop »

prezjordan wrote: post #117
nomadcoop wrote: post #20

I deleted my LinkedIn account last year because I got tired of dealing with spam emails from them and people bugging me to endorse them for skills. I still get emails from LinkedIn telling me someone would like to connect. For a site which is supposed to be about building professional connections I find them horrible to deal with.

Endorsements seem automated to me, and I almost feel like I'm taking crazy pills. Distant cousins endorsing you for Ruby? There's no way they actually clicked that button. I feel like LinkedIn is generating those as well, as a means of getting back on their platform.

Endorsements always seemed a bit off and it wouldn't surprise me if they were automated. I had an ex-colleague repeatedly contact me about endorsing him as he had endorsed me. At that time I hadn't looked at LinkedIn in months so I had no idea why he'd endorsed me. I got the impression that the site had suggested he do it and now obviously I should return the favour. All very annoying and one of the main reasons I closed my account.
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