Oh I don't know... how about keeping track of former co-workers, people you meet at networking events, and other professional connections? How about finding useful interesting industry or topic specific news and discussion via groups? Or if you are job-hunting, for finding a path to somebody who works at the company you're targeting, so you can try to get an inside testimonial? Or getting a warm intro when trying to contact VC's or Angel investors? Or perhaps for looking up an individual before meeting them in a professional setting, so you have some background on their experience / interests / etc? I mean, really, there are a million ways that LinkedIn is useful. The fact that they suck in so many other ways is pretty much orthogonal.
Yeah, I think we'd all prefer a site like LinkedIn that somehow manages to avoid "recruiter spam" and all that, but for me personally, I can tolerate a little recruiter spam... and hell, every once in a while I get something like that, that is actually interesting enough to pursue.
I don't think you're a programmer or maybe you were but are now at a higher level. My advice was more for practicing programmers than others. I personally get zero value out of linkedin. All the people I consider professional equals can be found on mailing lists, blogs, weekly digests, stackoverflow, meetups, etc. Keeping track of them is quite easy and I don't need a third party in that process that just spams me.
Oh I'm definitely a programmer... but I do more than just program, yes. I have a startup I've been working on for a while, and I consider networking an essential activity... and LinkedIn has been a valuable resource in that regard.
That said, I think LI has value even if you're not interested in founding a startup or whatever. I mean, I'd rather keep a (more or less) master "rolodex" of people I know and have some connection to, on LinkedIn, than have to spend all sorts of time trawling through old email lists, Quora, Meetup, SO, etc., just to find somebody's info. But that's just me.
It indeed is just you. I don't know how you're going to find anyone worthwhile if all you do is keep everything restricted to linkedin. I've met plenty of awesome people at meetups, conferences, etc. that don't have a linkedin profile and maintain control of their own web presence. A simple bookmark and an email contact list is not much of a burden to keep track of such people in my opinion.
Now you are projecting otherness to people who do things differently than you. "Being a programmer" is not some weird club where everyone needs to behave exactly the same. Bytes and algorithms have zero tribal affinity, you know.
And you are misinterpreting everything I say and not even trying to address any of the points that are made in the original post and my subsequent comments.
To get things back on track here are the points. Cultivating a professional network does not require mediating parties like linkedin and can be accomplished by more decentralized and democratic means that lets each professional maintain control over their own digital presence. Linkedin does not do that and in fact diminishes everyones' ability to do so and therefore it is a bad trade-off to make in the long term since I've already outlined several other ways of cultivating professional connections that are just as easy as keeping everything in linkedin.
Just because you get no value out of LinkedIn, doesn't mean other programmers don't.
I get useful information about available jobs in my segment of the industry because LinkedIn knows what kind of work I do as opposed to just "he's a programmer." The recruiters who contact me from LinkedIn are looking for people in a specific domain, as opposed to "knows language X and framework Y." I consider that to be a hell of a lot more useful than the usual email job spam.
I also get to see if I know someone who knows someone else that I might want to be introduced to. It's a lot harder to do this on your own without a stack of cross referenced rolodexes.
"All the people I consider professional equals can be found on mailing lists, blogs, weekly digests, stackoverflow, meetups,"
You have cultivated other networking channels. Great! But I would like to point out to you that now you make the basic cognitive fallacy thinking that anyone who is not doing it "your way" is doing it wrong.
They are indeed doing it wrong if the outcome is a company like linkedin. As technology professionals we can and should be doing much better but instead we are cultivating digital silos that add very little value.
I have opted out and nothing about my professional career has diminished so there is an alternative approach that requires nothing like linkedin. Since I'm a counter-example to all the claims your making and my way obviously leads to a more decentralized and democratic approach to professional development I don't really understand the continued support of digital silos like linkedin from people like you.
The claim that they are a digital rolodex is a very weak one since an email contact list serves that purpose just as easily. I'm starting to suspect you are PR spokesperson for linkedin.
Sorry, we are getting off track here. I apologize for my tone if it aggrieves you. It is obvious we have different values and considerations. No-one is a true scotsman I suppose :)
As I stated the main value proposition of LinkedIn for me is that most of my connections are there.
Replacing the said connections would require work and time, which I would rather spend on other things. The problem with an email list is that there is no automatic update if the email address changes. Therefore, changing to a email list would lead to a poorer result for me.
I prefer introversion to extroversion. Going out to meetings would therefore be a) mentally exhausting b) take time. The former is doable but the latter is really hard to come by with a 9-5 job and kids.
Now, as to the proposition of spending my energies trying to invent an open competitor to LinkedIn... Building communities takes a huge effort and seems to happen mostly by chance. Also, while being a technology professional my core skillset is in CAD and maths and I'm clueless when it comes to web technologies.
So, in order to do a fancy LinkedIn replacement would require a) time to improve on my web skills, which is really wasteful considering lots of people are good at it already, b) create the product c) move all my dear colleagues to the new network.
The last parts are actually the hardest, I have no idea how to build social sites or how to motivate people.
So, to rephrase why I use LinkedIn: It currently provides me value, and I do not see sufficient benefit to spend time changing mine and my colleagues habits when it comes to networking. Most things in life are morally ambiguous and all one can do is to try to do more good than harm within ones limits. Sometimes all an individual can do is go with the flow.
People have different internal motivations. Mine run completely against social things. I prefer to twiddle on algorithms, draw, play the guitar and play with my kids. I use the social frameworks that exist because I see the value they provide but have no energy to change them nor am I motivated to design alternatives to them.
Yeah, middle age, definetly :)
Most peoples are not motivated by ambiguous "this is evil because..." arguments. Most behavioural changes are best driven by positive motivators - one cannot drive people away from anything by saying "the thing is evil". Eating meat is evil and still people do it, including me. What needs to be done is to provide better alternatives that wean people away from option a) (the evil) to option b) over time.
Yeah, I think we'd all prefer a site like LinkedIn that somehow manages to avoid "recruiter spam" and all that, but for me personally, I can tolerate a little recruiter spam... and hell, every once in a while I get something like that, that is actually interesting enough to pursue.