This gentleman (lets call him Ed) is of the opinion that LinkedIN was created to gather people’s information under the guise of social networking… until the owners sell it – making boatloads of money and taking all your private information.

For me, as an educated (I try to be anyway) user who has sat on the sidelines watching the tool develop before jumping on the proverbial bandwagon, Ed sounds like Mel Gibson from Conspiracy Theory.

It’s important to note that Ed’s fears are not entirely unfounded. In late 2007 a social networking site known as Quechup received alot of bad press for allegedly sending spam emails to the entire contact list of each user (without the user’s knowledge). While Quechup denies these issues in a statement September 17th, 2007.

This is exactly why I encourage people to not be “early adopters” of technology in which you put your personal contact information. Wait a while, until you see a couple of buyouts or until people smarter than you are using and recommending the software (not to imply anything about your IQ – having friends smarter than you are is an integral part to staying safe in the technology age).

It’s also worth knowing that Social Networking sites rely on a large membership to serve the real money-making activity: transactions in the online marketplace OR online advertising to the membership. Only a few sites actually charge a subscription model (like LinkedIN) and this is only because they operate in the business side – selling subscriptions for advanced communication tools. Myspace recently changed hands (being sold to Google) without any user privacy issues, Facebook and Linkedin both of recently received additional investment dollars… again without stealing user info.

The internet and social networking specifically, offer opportunities for business models we’ve not seen before. If we care to get the most out of the advances around us, we must stay wise to our legal system and the standards by which our information is handled. Dissolving into paranoia not only hurts us, it holds us back from the advances laying before us.

oh, and did I mention that between google, jigsaw, and linkedin/facebook/myspace/thelistonline searches you can find just about anyone’s info…