[rdfweb-dev] Re: LinkedIn

Tim Mansfield timbomb at dstc.edu.au
Wed Jun 11 03:26:47 UTC 2003


> "[...] But it allows me to compose a note to Clinton, which is then
> routed to the closest of my connections to him. This person, I hope,
> will then forward my message, essentially vouching for me as he or she
> does so -- and so on, until Clinton gets my note and chooses to reply
> to me (or not)."
> 
> 
> This referral system sounds to me like the best model so far. There's
> nothing worse than being propositioned by strangers. This just seems
> more [natural] by not automating the trust element.

It is intriguing. I'm just not sure what's in it for the people doing all this 
vouching and message routing. I agree that it naturalises the trust model, but 
I'm a bit skeptical that users are going to put all this work in. Or is it 
very easy to do? Have you used this thing?

I've recently (after just about everyone else on this list) joined Friendster 
and it's on the cusp of requiring too much from me to be useful. A bit too 
much via the site, not quite enough via email, it's all fun until your network 
gets a bit too big and then it becomes another source of lots of extra work 
and waiting (for page loads mostly) and I find I get back to the fundamental 
user question: "What's in this for me again?"

I feel like we (a global community of developers kind of "we") are getting 
closer to getting this right though. The models *do* seem closer. It's just 
the little usability details...

Tim




More information about the foaf-dev mailing list