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I'd think this is pretty straightforward. The real business of LinkedIn is selling services to employers and space to advertisers [0]. The more data points th

I'd think this is pretty straightforward. The real business of LinkedIn is selling services to employers and space to advertisers [0]. The more data points they have on each user, the more numerous results they can return to recruiters and more specific targeting they can do with ads. Endorsements are a way to easily, indirectly expand a user profile by turning the additions into 1-click suggestions and consents rather than requiring real action by the user. If it were socially acceptable I expect they'd ask users to upload profile photos and estimate salaries for their connections too. 0: http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/08/01/linkedin-q2-earnings-revenue-beat-street/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/08/01/linkedin-q...

reinhardt 13y ago
> The more data points they have on each user, the more numerous results they can return to recruiters and more specific targeting they can do with ads. The thing is that endorsements at least are pretty noisy data. What's the point of shooting for quantity at the expense of quality?
- ColinDabritz 13y ago
  I happen to think the endorsements are part of one of the dark patterns. They get a set of endorsements from someone, because hey, I know that guy/gal and want to give them a boost. Then they get to email the person being endorsed, and say "hey, so and so endorsed you, you should put those on your profile!". So far, fairly banal, if cheesy. But I believe they hold them back. They don't just email right then, they save them, or some of them, so they can trickle out the info over time and keep emailing you. The amount of useless email I get from Linked-in is silly. They also do the auto opt-in to new (email intensive) features. Lately a lot of the useless info has been endorsements.
- incision 13y ago
  >"The thing is that endorsements at least are pretty noisy data. What's the point of shooting for quantity at the expense of quality?" Personally, the endorsements I receive are fairly noisy, but I'm acting as the second level of informed filter by choosing what to accept. The endorsements which make it to my profile are accurate. Unless I'm unique, I'd expect the resulting graph of accepted endorsements to be reasonably useful.
  - reinhardt 13y ago
    Well the classic example of garbage data is all recruiters getting endorsed for the two dozen technologies they are headhunting for.
marchra 13y ago
It's also a great way to trigger a notification email and reactivate LinkedIn users who haven't stopped by in a while.

reinhardt 13y ago

> The more data points they have on each user, the more numerous results they can return to recruiters and more specific targeting they can do with ads. The thing is that endorsements at least are pretty noisy data. What's the point of shooting for quantity at the expense of quality?

ColinDabritz 13y ago
I happen to think the endorsements are part of one of the dark patterns. They get a set of endorsements from someone, because hey, I know that guy/gal and want to give them a boost. Then they get to email the person being endorsed, and say "hey, so and so endorsed you, you should put those on your profile!". So far, fairly banal, if cheesy. But I believe they hold them back. They don't just email right then, they save them, or some of them, so they can trickle out the info over time and keep emailing you. The amount of useless email I get from Linked-in is silly. They also do the auto opt-in to new (email intensive) features. Lately a lot of the useless info has been endorsements.
incision 13y ago
>"The thing is that endorsements at least are pretty noisy data. What's the point of shooting for quantity at the expense of quality?" Personally, the endorsements I receive are fairly noisy, but I'm acting as the second level of informed filter by choosing what to accept. The endorsements which make it to my profile are accurate. Unless I'm unique, I'd expect the resulting graph of accepted endorsements to be reasonably useful.
- reinhardt 13y ago
  Well the classic example of garbage data is all recruiters getting endorsed for the two dozen technologies they are headhunting for.

marchra 13y ago

It's also a great way to trigger a notification email and reactivate LinkedIn users who haven't stopped by in a while.