Anti-Social Media?
July 8th, 2008 by jillSomebody told me they couldn’t see their colleague’s contacts on LinkedIn and she wanted me (a LinkedInner from waay back) to help her fix her settings. I agreed, since I was so sure she must be doing something wrong. After all, I can see the contacts of all my friends. Or, so I thought. After accepting an invite to LinkedIn, I almost always scan the person’s contacts and see if there might be a long lost buddy of mine with whom I could re-connect. That’s all part of the fun, isn’t it?
I’ve since learned that LinkedIn allows you to block others from viewing your network. I’ve even found a couple of friends’ listings that “do not allow” browsing of their contacts. Why would you do that? Isn’t the point of social media for us to interact, connect, re-connect and network with each other? It seems that blocking others from seeing your contacts is kind of “Anti-Social Media.” What do you think? Do you dis-connect with people that block you from seeing their network??
July 8th, 2008 at 10:22 am
To some extent, I understand the blocks on sites that are more personal than LinkedIn. For example, you can not let people who you aren’t friends with on Facebook see your full profile. But on a business networking site? It’s ridiculous. It’s the whole point of the thing. Who are you linked to that’s so special it can’t be revealed?
Unless I know of a really good reason for it (stalker, witness protection program), I’m not going to put work into building social connections with people who are non-reciprocating dead-ends. Not that I’m using friends for their network, because I’m not, but because they’re able to glean the benefits of everyone else’s relationships.
July 9th, 2008 at 7:14 am
i totally get the blocking and i block.
here’s why.
i have use linkedin to connect to people and people are always able to request a connection to someone in my network whom they do not have visibility of. so it’s not “anti-social”.
i do not give everyone i know access to my contacts though. would you give open access to your outlook contacts or your rolodex?
i have some people who would prefer that i keep their contact details out of the open like that.
it is also good politic sometimes because i have relationships with people who don’t necessarily like each other.
like i said though, more often than not if one of my contacts needs to contact someone that linkedin tells them i know, i have no hesitation in picking up the phone and putting them in touch with each other.
i think it’s dangerous to assume that everyone works in the same way as we do or will leverage social networks in the same way that we do.
July 9th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
Jonathan, you raise some good points. For LinkedIn, it seems to me that people are made well aware that their contact info (as much as they choose to reveal) will be visible — so I don’t think of it like opening up my Rolodex. You’re right … I do tend to live on the dangerous side, assuming everybody works/thinks the way that I do.