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LinkedIn Promises To Bring Order and Meaning To Your Useless Endorsements (qz.com)

Posted by msmash on from the bringing-meaning-to-life dept.

Oliver Staley, reporting for Quartz: LinkedIn's endorsement feature has never felt like the most trustworthy of sources. Rather than a panel of star witnesses who can honestly vouch for you, it more often seems like a random assortment of friends, acquaintances, and opportunists hoping for an endorsement in return. LinkedIn has recognized the problem and is trying to address it by creating a hierarchy of endorsers. Instead of all your endorsements having equal weight, the site will highlight people who might actually have some claim on knowing you, such as former colleagues and classmates, or who have credibility in the field. The goal is to make the feature more like the real world, where you ask for recommendations from people you trust or are in a position to know, says Hari Srinivasan, head of the LinkedIn team developing the feature. "If you want to find a good designer, you ask other good designers," he said.

10 of 48 comments (clear)

  1. Correlating LinkedIn data with my PC by QuietLagoon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    With Microsoft using Windows 10 to harvest data from my PC (emails, web browsing, etc), and Microsoft owning LinkedIn's data ... well, I've already have started to drastically reduce what I have on LinkedIn.

    1. Re:Correlating LinkedIn data with my PC by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      well, I've already have started to drastically reduce what I have on LinkedIn

      If you were worried about some company or people using the information you put up on LinkedIn.... you were using it wrong.

  2. Counterpoint... by pr0t0 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    A few years ago, I got a network request from the college-bound daughter of a client of mine. I thought, "Oh that's nice. She's starting early to build her professional network." So I clicked the acknowledgement. I then got a message stating something like, "Great! We'll notify her that you are interested in joining her network!"

    I don't know if that was the exact wording, but the message made think there was an AI at work trying to make connections on behalf of the girl, and that because I responded, it would send my request to her out of nowhere. So she's 18 and I'm 40, and now I look like some kind of creepy stalker.

    I haven't used LinkedIn since that day. It's just as well. I see little value in the site. To me, it's just a tool for head-hunting companies to spam me with requests to hire me or help the recruiter find someone who has my skill set and qualifications. Yeah, I'll get right on that.

    --
    I'm sorry, but your opinion seems to be wrong.
    1. Re:Counterpoint... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Informative

      I have also been "tricked" into making unsolicited connections, thinking the other party had initiated it.

      When I first created my LinkedIn account, they asked for my Yahoo and Gmail email addresses, and then ASKED FOR THE PASSWORDS. I saw no reason to provide that information, but my wife fell for it, and LinkedIn then, without her permission, logged into her accounts and sent a link request to every single person in her contact list, consisting of over 3000 people, many of whom she barely knew and hadn't heard from in years. Each email was phrased to imply that she was personally requesting the connection.

      LinkedIn was a very sleazy company. They should fit right in at Microsoft.

    2. Re:Counterpoint... by war4peace · · Score: 4, Interesting

      That's why I never accept any requests unless they are accompanied by non-generic invite text. Also, once accepted, they have two weeks to send me a message, otherwise they're removed from my network.
      Many recruiters added me, only to be removed after two weeks because they never wrote me anything. i'm not going to become one of the 10K contacts they boatd having.

      --
      ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
  3. I doubt they have the will to make things better. by luvirini · · Score: 2

    As Linked in seems mostly to be a spamming site of useless contacts. They would lose a lot of the so called "value" if they stopped the stupid spamming and only linked people to actual people they interact with as people could see how empty things are in reality.

  4. Best part about LinkedIn! by steveo777 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I always loved Endorsement Roulette on LinkedIn. I only log in every month or so (if I'm not actively pursuing something) and nothing beats seeing that real estate agent you never actually hired endorsing me for Python Development and CPU Design. I'm reasonably certain I never discussed either of these with that dude, because at the time I wasn't heavily into Python... and Intel keeps telling me that nobody needs a CPU made out of reconstituted coffee grounds.

    --
    This sig isn't original enough, it's time to come up with something witty...
    1. Re:Best part about LinkedIn! by aicrules · · Score: 5, Funny

      On the other side of the coin, I find joy in endorsing my friends in the most random weird things I can find in LinkedIn's pre-built list of endorsements. Did it enough that LinkedIn temporarily suspended my ability to endorse...if only one friend had accepted the "Breastfeeding" endorsement.

  5. Linked in needs to learn from Slashdot. by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Need a Slashdot moderation type system for Linked In.

    Bob from accounting, +1 Insightful
    Julie from Veridian Dynamics, -1 floozie
    Greg from Acme weapons, -1 racist

    Darn, I've run out of moderation points to mod Sally.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  6. LinkedIn recommendations are mostly bogus by dcavanaugh · · Score: 2

    I have written 100% truthful, positive recommendations for some really good people. And some of those people have written 100% truthful, positive recommendations for me. But in the competitive marketplace, the value of this information is lost as truthful stories are diluted into an ocean of fiction.

    The only thing LinkedIn is good for is entertainment. It's fun to visit the profile of known underachievers, just to see who is writing "quid pro quo" recommendations. I have seen stories about accomplishments that never happened, touting various achievements for projects that were spectacular failures.

    And all of this is on top of imaginary degrees, fictional job titles at imaginary companies, or sometimes inflated job titles at real companies. Fact-checking this stuff is tougher than it looks. Most employers have a strict "no comment" policy regarding ex-employees. And then there are all the companies (and even colleges) that no longer exist. Even if a person can produce a reference to vouch for their story, it may turn out to be a case of one liar validating another. Background checks are definitely not working. I know of some people with fictional LinkedIn profiles, and somehow they bounce from one employer to the next with impunity.