LinkedIn -- my good experience with a social networking site

I've been having a lot of fun this week with LinkedIn, a social networking site that is particularly popular in the IT community. It purports to be a way to meet useful new business contacts, and I've indeed seen a little evidence of that. One person told me he uses it for market research; another uses it to find conference speakers; a third uses it for hiring; and I myself found an interesting research contact -- who promptly wrote about the experience of that contact in his own blog, in a longer article about LinkedIn than I propose to write.

Where I think LinkedIn really shines, however, is as an aid to tracking down or keeping up with a person you already know. True, in many cases, you can also find a person you used to know via an ordinary Web search, but LinkedIn has several advantages over that strategy. First of all, many people can not easily be found on the Web. Second, even if they can, you may not easily find their most recent work position (which is what you need to deduce a current email address or phone number). Third, if you don't remember the exact spelling of their name, a Web search risks being pretty useless.

If you like or believe it is useful to network with people, LinkedIn is worth checking out. You can sign up in a very fast way that doesn't compromise your privacy.

Related link: My own LinkedIn profile.