Linkedin Answers Shuts Down | Hacker News Reader

Linkedin Answers Shuts Down

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36 pointsJimWillTri30 comments

And I just started looking at them a few days ago.

LinkedIn needs to shut down endorsements next. I'm tired of people endorsing me for skills they don't actually lend any credibility to. Although I'll admit it's fun to counter their generosity by endorsing them in Alcoholism and Horse Training.

So true. I took the endorsements area off my profile. My "image processing" expertise was endorsed by a fellow I knew solely through screenwriting, which isn't surprising given how pushy LinkedIn is getting about endorsing other contacts' expertise.

I've managed to get "coffee" to #6 most endorsed in my Skills & Expertise.... I suspect that I'm not taking it as seriously as LinkedIn thinks I should ;-)

For a while I had "trolling" listed on my profile, then one day it just disappeared.

Bravo Sir/Madam ;-)

Reminds me of a friend who had "X's hobbies include lying about his hobbies, lists, and the Oxford comma." on his CV.

It's become an office joke to have everyone endorse this one guy for MS Office.

He hates it.

I think endorsements were a terrible strategic move for LI. It's already at the point that nobody believes the endorsements, and it just makes people not want to deal with the site because of the awkward situations they create.

Twice a week I get endorsed for a random skill by someone I barely know. I'm assuming these are either misclicks or people clicking the "Endorse these 4 people" popup you get on some screens.

As such, endorsements seem to have very little credence, and I certainly wouldn't be swayed by any I saw in other's profiles.

I agree, and I get endorsed by people I know but who know nothing about my capability of that particular skill (because they've never seen it exercised in my relationship with them).

I can only surmise they endorse me because once you give an endorsement you're encouraged to endorse the endorser right back, and maybe they're hoping for endorsement.

In short, since I get unqualified endorsements from others, I don't put any stock in endorsements that others have. It was a nice idea, but they should really pull the service.

I completely agree. I have chosen to not list endorsements to my profile, but LinkedIn still allows others the ability to endorse me. I added "Basket Weaving" as a skill, and have been endorsed for it.

I hate endorsements. People who i hardly know, saying that i'm good at "Cloud" does not help me at all!

Completely agree, because it's totally meaningless. I would much rather see LinkedIn focus more on Recommendations, which are the real prize.

Has LinkedIn launched any usable features (Endorsements and LinkedIn Today do not count IMHO) in the past few years? They removed Events, Answers, Github integration, job search agents and others. Groups are basically spam repositories. Not sure exactly what they are working on.

I haven't heard of any major enhancements or killer features. The last time LinkedIn as in the news was when they released their iPhone app

A shame. I found Answers actually a great place to network virtually. In the old days, before it was hidden, I used to answer a couple of questions a week and made sure I did it well. Made some nice new connections and actually garnered some work that way.

In comparison, I find he Groups noisy and pointless.

Was it popular? I had never heard of Linkedin Answers before today, what was it exactly? Something like stack overflow?

Me neither, never heard of Answers before!

Yes it was popular... The majority of business owners are not techie. They probably do not know about StackOverflow. So answering questions asked by business owners on Linkedin was a great way to make an impression. The biggest problem with with linkedin it that it's just overrun with requiters and social media experts. It's not professional anymore.

Answers evolved from a Q/A section to a just another portal for a social media expert to just refer to someone in their network. It was really annoying... The shutting down of Answers should be a warning to anyone that is trying to build credibility on a network, it can close at anytime and all your answers/reputation is gone

As someone who has not used Answers, could you explain a bit more about what (if anything) differentiated it from Quora or StackExchange?

There was nothing special about it... just a simple Q/A site. The concept was to get points for answering questions and those points made you look better to potential business partners. Quora and SE, are websites built around Q/A... Those are products... this was just a feature of linkedin

The same.

I used to try and put forth some genuinely helpful answers, and also made some good connections from it.

For the Groups, unless they are heavily moderated by the Group owner they devolve quickly into total crap. People either post pointless spammy press releases, links to lame blogs, or respond to questions for help with a problem with horrible product suggestions.

In my opinion, linkedin answers were far better than the groups. Groups are easy to start but hard to maintain and keep engaged. I have learnt that the best way to keep audience focussed is to give specifics which answers can do better than a group. For example, creating a group called "Python developers" might attract a few folks but what do you do when you join it ? A more specific question like "What technology stack is used by python developers for web" will definitely attract a more engaged conversation.

In my opinion, linkedin answers were far better than the groups

That's damning with faint praise - being better than groups isn't a very high bar ;-)

So true, are there any worth joining? The UX/web design/CSS ones are jokes and so are their [multiple] G+ counterparts.

This is the first time I hear someone saying this about G+ groups. I've felt this way ever since people wanted to move to G+ just for its own sake.

Yeah, I'm not sure if user-generated groups were the way to go with that one. I have no idea which of the ten with the same name are worth joining, so I don't join any at all.

I have successfully used Linkedin 3 times in last 6 years to secure a contract job.I was able to do that due to a very niche profile and well connected with similar co-workers in the industry. That is where the strength of Linkedin is: networking/connections with your co-workers. I can keep tab on my ex and present co-workers as to where they are, what they are doing and if they could be useful to me for a next gig or reference etc. The recommendation feature can be useful if done well. I have a decent number of recommendations but all are from actual co-workers I worked with on many projects and I ask them to be specific if they do want to give a recommendation. Generic ones are BS.

Everything else like endorsements (the most useless feature) groups, answers, job postings are mostly crap and does not really add much more value than other existing career sites.

For example, if I am interested in a person/company, I try to look them up on linkedin. Their profile tells me what I need to know if they have relevant information listed. To an extent, I could care about their "answers" or group activity but does it really mean much when the newsfeed says "X person just joined IT professionals group". Sure, other than the fact that I already know he is IT professional.

meh, I don't know if accountants and lawyers gave that any use but never even looked or thought about that for questions or research. Linkedin is a good way for non-technical people to see a non-technical profile for you. They should just be focus on being good at that, job postings (which aren't that great/overpriced) and a company directory.

I liked the "Was this answer helpful?" at the end. Nice touch.

Congrats. Halfway to the ultimate goal.

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