Oh Why Oh Why...

Yea, I know.....

When I go to my profile, it always wants to know if I know among others..
Ted D-Bear Dura..
I let sleeping bears lie.

WOW. I second the motion. I hate Linked in. They are evil!

Sorry to everybody who got an invite from me.

N

Has anyone found any benefit to LinkedIn ?

We got one of the invitations "from Scott" here, and I was surprised that it was addressed to my wife (what are you up to, Scott? 😛 ). Actually, she used our older shared email address when she signed up for LinkedIn. I used that older address when I discussed some astronomy with Scott a long time back, thus the connection.

I usually, but not always, respond to LinkedIn requests if I recognize some connection with the requester, but I don't actually use the site myself. I originally joined because it seemed like it might have some value, but in the several years I've been a member I have yet to see any significant benefit to membership. So if you send me a link request and I don't respond, don't take it personally -- I'm probably just too busy to deal with it.

As evil as facebook? 😉 (fb quite evil in my opinion)

I have found LI to be of minor help from time to time. I felt compelled to quit FB due to severe lack of value for me. (I have no desire to see before/ after pics of someone's meal myself......among other annoyances)

I signed up for Linkedin. Never completely filled out the profile.

I too must apologize to everyone for not responding to anyone. Not intentionally, but I never have remembered my password and don't ever take the time to ask for it.

It's not the site that I thought that it was when I signed on, so never kept up with the going on there.

:-$

I have seen a couple of benefits, I think I first joined because it was the only way I could find to contact a former salesperson who was the only hope of learning about some stuff at his former employer.

I have also seen some positive things with other professionals viewing my profile that are potential clients and in one case I was recruited by a legitimate agency to fulfill a job opening they had.

I think for a professional on line presence it is becoming the new tool of choice for folks looking for you for various reasons.

I haven't really noticed an increase in SPAM because of it and it has been of some use for me in connecting with other professionals.

My $0.02 anyway.

SHG

I agree with Shelby . If you are trying to hunt down someone for a business matter, there is a good chance that they can be found there for contact info besides googling.
But I don't use it that much and only try to connect with some old associates or some new ones but I am not that earnest in doing so.

I signed for 3 surveying news groups and also have a few soccer connections and signed up for three soccer news groups.

Only have a few dozen connections. most are surveying and some are local.
Only have a few soccer connections and have
one soccer/surveying connection from Barcelona who I accepted an invite from since he found we had similar interests.

I don't know about FB. I admin the FB page for our local soccer club. Most of the followers are soccer moms. I use it for PR and marketing the club locally.
In order to admin the soccer page, I had to set up a personal account. I have 4 friends. Swmbo, a niece living in Lagos who keeps everyone updated on her life and links to her blog, an old HS friend who now owns the tavern of one my HS girl friends. He has over 1200 friends and they are 95% co-eds from local colleges who hang there, Another friend who I worked with in New Orleans and was a draftsman and held the rod at times. But he is also a renowned Louisiana musician who has over 1200 friends of musicians and media types.
I had a business FB page years ago because I was told that there was going to be a surveyor circle there for discussion but I think it never materialized so it went dormant.

I have never joined FB or LI. My older daughter thinks I should join LI, but I don't trust it, particularly because of all the horror stories I have heard of FB. I am pretty easy to find on Google, so I really don't think that LI has anything to offer me other than aggravation.

Well..I just looked and there are over 1000 members of the American Association of Geodetic Surveyors on LI.
There is also another geodesy discussion group but it appears to kind of dormant except from someone ..I think from Turkey that dominates the posts.

I know some people who have had their FB accounts hacked and I am not a big user of social media. Except for the soccer club where I reach anywhere from 50-150 FB users for news of the club..fundraisers, registration for tourney notices etc...

> WOW. I second the motion. I hate Linked in. They are evil!
>
> Sorry to everybody who got an invite from me.
>
> N

A Men

Because they asked, probably...

I've never had a problem with LI. It often asks if I want to use my Yahoo or Gmail address books to see if there are other people I might know already on LI, but I decline.

I don't understand FB at all. I created an account there several years ago because some friends said it was a great way to stay connected. Well, so is email and the phone. The few times that I've logged in to FB, I see a string of short comments from various people that I know, or maybe people who know people I know, and no comment seems to have anything to do with any other comment by anyone else. It's like the crowds at the Tower of Babel - lot's of virtual babbling but no communication.

LI has various forums for different occupations and interests and I have joined in some very good discussions.

I've been able to find colleagues that I had lost track of, so that's a positive. I get invites to connect from lots of people who I've never heard of and can't see why they feel a connection with me would be beneficial. Some people seem to collect connections like a kid collecting baseball cards. I don't see the value in that. If it's someone I know, someone who is in a line of work that makes sense to make a business connection with, or someone who comes by way of introduction or recommendation, I normally accept. Otherwise, I ignore.

A recently new thing is "endorsements". This seems like a good idea on its face, but I've received endorsements from prople who are in no position to know what my knowledge or capabilities are in the areas they endorse me for. I've received endorsements for aspects of surveying that I have very little knowledge of and certainly don't consider to be within my area of competence. I'm grateful for the endorsements from those in a position to reasonably assess my abilities and for those areas in my areas of expertise, but their potential value gets diminished by the rest.

So far, overall, I've received perhaps a little value from LI, so I'm just a little on the positive side of ambivalent toward it. I've talked to others who have said that they've had a significant amount of business come their way because of their LI membership. Good for them. If I go back into private practice, maybe I'll make greater use of it.

I've experienced no reason for fear or loathing of it though.