It's the same pattern that every similar company goes through -- open and inclusive, increasingly to closed and defensive. Aside from outside services increasi

It's the same pattern that every similar company goes through -- open and inclusive, increasingly to closed and defensive. Aside from outside services increasingly being blocked from constructively accessing LinkedIn's API, the company is becoming more insular in the other direction as well: Where once it allowed you to configure an external blog that could be itemized as stories on your own profile (which seems like a perfectly logical integration point if a LinkedIn profile were considered a central point of professional information), LinkedIn dumped that in favour of a invitation only siloed-data approach. No thanks. Where once I saw LinkedIn as an interesting Rolodex, increasingly I am getting an impression that one's career is in a bad place if feeding the LinkedIn beast is an important activity.