At the beginning, there was LinkedIn. One of the first social networks. One of the first business social networks. Definitely my first social network.
While the idea of networking was made quite clear by LinkedIn right from the beginning, it didn’t feel like much of a social tool. Everything was so still. It wasn’t until the dynamics of Facebook took over, that the LinkedIn people started to evolve.
So after expanding my business social network greatly through Facebook and Meetup, crowning the Ning networks as best sources for what I needed, ignoring the not very useful (for me) Xing, looking down at the snobs’ network ASW which won’t endorse socializing, toying a little with Twitter and trying to figure out why Pulse, I came back to LinkedIn.
Inch by inch they adopt more and more ideas from Facebook. One of the best adoptions – the groups. Early on I established the “Israel Hi-Tech Entrepreneurs Wherever” group and it’s got some really interesting members now, all willing to share their experience in establishing hi-tech global companies, being Israeli, here or there.
Unlike Ning, where every group sharing an interest is a totally separate network, with different site structure and members, here, on LinkedIn, all the groups do belong to one big network – the LinkedIn. All groups look the same, and surprisingly, the fact that they are not personalized (other than the group’s logo) actually helps to manage with several groups:
All relevant messages go into the same LinkedIn inbox. It’s on the same site that I can find pretty comprehensive and relevant information about the people who contribute from their knowledge to the groups’ discussions.
The best thing, really, is the ability to connect with total strangers not for the sake of creating the Guinness-Book-Of-Records longest contacts list, but for real relevant professional exchange of information, knowledge and expert opinions.
So I joined a couple of new groups, got replies to really important questions, and found some new friends from really ‘exotic’ countries, whom I never could have found had it not been for this groups method.
(More about my new found friends will follow)
December 4, 2008 at 12:14
Until a while ago, LinkedIn was just a website to share your CV & get intros to relevant people After their additional investment ($53m) early this year, LinkedIn started working on serious improvements, making better use of their popular platform. This led to the growth of live groups & sub-communities within the website, which I find to be extremely useful.
I think that in this case, LinkedIn is the one which raised the bar.
Facebook must also improve their groups since right now 99% of (my) facebook groups aren’t active… In addition, there is no good way to know what’s going on inside the groups without constantly checking them, making it practically a useless feature.. (which has a lot of potential)
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December 4, 2008 at 13:00
I totally agree, Aviv. I believe the groups would become more useful in Facebook if they would create a groups feed, either built in your regular feed or a separate tab. But surely, this and the digest option, is what makes the LinkedIn groups so useful and alive.
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February 2, 2009 at 14:59
Thanks for your article on LinkedIn. I’ve joined 7 or 8 LinkedIn groups. Sometimes the discussion themes are really good and people put effort into writing thought provoking comments.
I guess I like ecademy a little better in some ways because I can join so many groups and the group moderators make me feel my voice really counts for something.
I also like this personality ….”tag” ? thing they have got going at ecademy. I’m a high yellow there and since I know the personality type of the new person I’m trying to contact in advance I can tailor my writing a little better to their needs (hopefully).
Anyway with the groups on LinkedIn, keeping up with Facebook, doing my twittering and occasionally checking in on Xing I am finding it hard to keep track of all of it and not knowing how to manage my social networking time very well.
Guess this is becoming rantish so I’ll stop.
In closing may I say I like your writing style and the look of your blog. It is very inviting.
I’m interested in holography so if you know anyone who is interested in it where you are please let me know.
All the best,
HAL in Tokyo
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February 2, 2009 at 15:48
Thank you Hal in Tokyo! 🙂
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