LinkedIn Most Unusual Members - Meet the Super-Connected - StevenBurda

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From: www.cio.com

LinkedIn's Most Unusual Members: Meet The Super-Connected

– C.G. Lynch, CIO

December 10, 2008

Steven Burda, 27, says he can guess whatyou'll think about him at first. The formerSoviet Union resident who now lives in aPhiladelphia suburb has more than 34,000immediate contacts (known as"connections") on LinkedIn, the online socialnetwork for professionals. "The perception

is that someone like me must have toomuch time on my hands," he says. "I'veheard that a few times." In fact, Burda israted number four among themost-connected LinkedIn members — andbelongs to a controversial group of LinkedInusers called open networkers. Butdismissing him as an Internet eccentricwould be wrong.

More LinkedIn coverage on CIO.comLinkedIn Etiquette: Five Dos and Don'tsLinkedIn vs. Facebook: Is the "Boring" Underdog Poised to Beat Its Flashy Competitor?LinkedIn Tips: How Many Connections Is Too Many?

Burda lives a busy, productive life, one that would make politicians touting the promise of the Americandream gush during campaign rallies. The Ukrainian son of a dentist (father) and a mechanical engineer(mother), Burda and his family moved to the United States in the early 1990's. He earned an MBA fromSt. Joseph's University and speaks three languages fluently. He does financial planning for aerospaceand defense giants like Boeing and Lockheed Martin. On the side, he started a non-profit to provideconsulting to small businesses. He and his wife are expecting a baby boy any day now.

So why does Burda give LinkedIn — and fellow users of the service, many of whom he couldn't identifyif they sat down next to him at a coffee shop — so much attention? Quite simply, he likes helpingpeople.

"For me, it's a hobby and a passion," he says. "They call me the Mother Teresa of social networking. Ihelp people find jobs or secure VC [venture capital] on LinkedIn. There are plenty of places that chargeall this money to use their job tools, but I help people without seeking anything in return. I firmly believethe karma comes back to you eventually."

Burda's pay-it-forward philosophy is shared by his fellow "open networkers," an increasingly significantgroup of LinkedIn users who accept the majority of invitations to connect on LinkedIn, no matterwhether they know the person or not. Open networkers also help other people connect with oneanother by introducing them online, even if they don't know either person in any personal orprofessional capacity. This approach runs counter to the wishes of LinkedIn, which publicly encouragespeople to connect only with people they know. During the past couple of years, LinkedIn has eventaken measures within the design of the service to curtail the practice of open networking.

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Pictured above is Steven Burda. He has more than 34,000 connections on LinkedIn.

But the steady emergence of LinkedIn open networkers (frequently called LIONs) has implications forLinkedIn, its user base and the future of social networks in general. Analysts say banning or prohibitingopen networkers would adversely affect average users who rely on LIONs to introduce them toprospective business associates and job opportunities. For LinkedIn as a company, open networkerscomplicate how the social network plans to make money selling premium accounts that give recruitersbroader access to its network of 30 million professionals.

How LinkedIn Open Networkers (LIONs) Came to Be

LinkedIn, which launched in 2003, created an online environment conducive to open networking, muchmore so than its main competitor, Facebook. From the start, connecting with someone randomly onFacebook had more perils. Because contacts on Facebook (labeled as "Friends") share personal

pictures, status messages and videos with one another, users tended to be more cautious about whothey gave permission to view their pages. This feeling was bolstered as stories popped up regularlyabout people getting fired after their bosses discovered inappropriate content involving them onFacebook.

LinkedIn's profile pages, on the other hand, started — and remain — all business. Though LinkedInrecently gave users the option to add third-party applications from companies like Google andAmazon, a typical LinkedIn profile is still little more than an online resume with information that mostpeople would feel comfortable posting on the public internet. LinkedIn generally doesn't prompt usersto display personal information that can lead to identity theft, such as birth dates.

As a result, most people on LinkedIn also decide to keep their profiles publicly accessible, making iteasier for future employers to find them.

"The LinkedIn profiles, due to their design, are just much cleaner than Facebook," says Jason Alba,

CEO of Jibberjobber.com, a career management firm and author of the book I'm On LinkedIn — NowWhat?. "Random connections don't have as much of an immediate impact as it would on Facebook."

Like most nascent social networking sites, LinkedIn, in its early days, put few restrictions on its users.Many open networkers built huge connection lists. But in January, 2006, in response to substantialgrowth and to clarify its own vision for the service, the company made some changes.

LinkedIn limited users to sending out 3,000 invitations, lifetime. The site made some modifications to itsprofile pages, too. Prior to this time, LinkedIn profiles displayed how many connections people made.Under the new changes, if a person connected with more than 500 people, their public profile pagewould read "500+" rather than showing the total amount. Many open networkers during this time hadalready garnered thousands of connections.

Those two moves led to the creation of the LION group, which most people agree was officiallyfounded by Christian Mayaud, a venture capitalist who believed firmly in open networking. He started aYahoo groups site and many followed.

John Evans, another founding member and a UK-based consultant, estimates that today there areapproximately 16,000 LION members. Thousands more adhere to similar principles without the officialtitle. According to Evans, during the group's early days, LIONs believed the LinkedIn site changeswere the social network's way of contending with explosive growth.

"They [LinkedIn] simply didn't have the money or resources to cope with the speed of growth anddemand for support," Evans says. "So, it seemed, they tried to stop network growth and it was aroundthis time that Super-Networkers, as they were once kindly dubbed, began to become pariahs. Wronglyor rightly, many felt that the restrictions were unnecessary and undesirable, and so the LIONs [wereestablished]."


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To continue growing their connection lists, LIONs circumvent LinkedIn's restrictions in a few ways.While the service placed the 3,000 limit on how many invitations users can send, it didn't place any capon how many they can receive. In addition, if you want to connect with someone outside yourimmediate network, LinkedIn asks you for that person's e-mail address before you can send thatperson an invitation (a rule designed by LinkedIn to establish that you know the person in question).Since LinkedIn doesn't provide an e-mail field in its profile pages, many LIONs provide their e-mailaddress somewhere in their summary or biography sections, making it easy for strangers viewing theirpublic profile to send them invitations to connect. While the LIONs don't require their members to doso, they'll accept almost all invitations.

Today, several members of LION, including Mayaud, Evans and Burda, can be tracked ontoplinked.com, a site that lists the top 50 most connected people on LinkedIn.

Complicated Relationships Matter: Why LinkedIn and the LIONs Need Each Other

LinkedIn's main slogan is "Relationships Matter." This cuts to the core of the social network'sphilosophy and the way it designed the site: connect with people you know. That said, LinkedInencourages some serendipitous discovery of people outside their immediate connections by secondand third degrees of separation. For instance, two degrees away, people can see their connections ofconnections (think: friends of friends) and send them invitations to connect. In order to connect withpeople three degrees away (friends of friends of friends), users must get digitally "introduced" throughmutual connections.

According to LinkedIn, a connections list reflects your reputation as a professional. If you connect withanyone and everyone, it's hard to keep track of contacts that populate your connections list. Presumingsome of those connections are, even unknowingly to you, shady operators, it reflects badly upon you.

"Growing your LinkedIn ecosystem to reflect your real world business connections is critical since itdefines the people you'd recommend and support, even if it means putting your professional reputationon the line," Patrick Crane, LinkedIn's VP of marketing, wrote in a blog post in November.

According to Alba of Jibberjobber.com, LinkedIn's defense of this strategy hasn't been without a fewinconsistencies; LIONs might use even stronger language. For example, when new users sign up for aLinkedIn account, the service offers to troll their e-mail boxes to see if they have potential connectionsalready on LinkedIn.

"LinkedIn says only connect with people you know and trust," Alba says. "But then it says, by the way,import all your Outlook and Gmail contacts. Many of those aren't close friends and business contacts."

Burda, who estimates that he can reach at least 90 percent of the LinkedIn network with his immediateconnections and second and third degrees of separation, says he believes that LinkedIn's stanceagainst open networking might stem from the fact open networkers cannibalize other revenuegenerating areas for the company.

While LinkedIn sells advertising to help subsidize the experience of free users, another significantrevenue stream comes fromselling special premium accounts to recruiters, salespeople and otherbusinesses interested in getting easier access to the 30 million professionals on the service. Thesevalue-added services include increased search results and the ability to send "InMails," which allow youto contact not only your second and third degree contacts, but also people outside your network.LinkedIn's "business plus plan" runs for $50 per month (or $500 for the year), and its "corporatesolutions" plan lets companies buy multiple accounts with premium services and access to LinkedIn(prices aren't provided on LinkedIn's website).

"LinkedIn could see someone like me as a threat or as eating into their revenue," Burda says. "I'm not

a recruiter either. This is just my hobby."

According to Alba, LinkedIn and the LIONs have a complicated relationship. The LIONs need LinkedInto build upon their network philosophy that more connections are better; LinkedIn needs LIONsbecause they are some of the service's most enthusiastic promoters.

"I haven't seen LinkedIn take a stand, or a strong stand, on this," Alba says. "Many of the opennetworkers are actually helping LinkedIn grow, since they are such passionate evangelists. I'mguessing this is a topic that LinkedIn is just going to be silent on, for now."

LinkedIn doesn't mind acknowledging the existence of LIONs, but the company remains unwavering inits own networking philosophy.


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"My comments in regards to the LIONs are very similar to what we have said (in the past)," saysKrista Canfield, a LinkedIn spokeswoman. "We always advocate that our users only connect and addpeople to their network that they know and trust."

In Defense of Open Networking

During a recession, most people wouldn't want to be in the situation Todd Herschberg now findshimself. Recently, he worked on a contract basis as a marketing consultant to help drive web traffic toLike.com, an e-commerce retail site. By his co-workers accounts, he did a good job — his effortsincreased traffic to the site and fattened the company's revenue. But the contract expired and he isnow without a job in the worst economic climate since the Great Depression.

But Herschberg has something on his side: he's a LION. With more than 16,000 connections,according to TopLinked.com, he is the 45th most connected person on LinkedIn. He has alreadyreceived inquires for new gigs.

"My phone has been ringing pretty steadily," Herschberg says. "You never know where your nextopportunity will come from. I have, over the years, been contacted by people who I never would havecome in contact with if it hadn't been for LinkedIn. No, I don't know of all of them. But we come acrossthousands of people over the course of our careers."

Herschberg adheres to some typical LION principles: with few exceptions (mostly spam), he acceptsall invitations to connect. Herschberg also serves another role on the network: he introduces disparatestrangers looking to connect. He admits that bridging two connections works better when he knows the

two people involved. He also notes you must watch out for bad actors.

"Some open networkers are just name collectors or they just market [products] to people," Herschbergsays. "But for many of us, the 'paying it forward' is what's most important and why we do it."

Burda, for his part, doesn't just connect people in one vertical industry sector. He doesn't care if youhave 25 connections or 2,500. On his LinkedIn profile page, hotel managers, consultants, accountants,CEOs, bankers, auditors, and IT managers sing his praises, with recommendations thanking him forhis help.

Edwin Thomas, an Indianapolis-area health care strategist, summed it up for the cynics on arecommendation he posted to Burda's profile.

"Steven is everything he claims," he wrote. "I asked Steven for a connection to a very senior levelexecutive at a leading health care plan. In a matter of minutes, Steven responded with 'I will help you.'

First thing the next morning, Steven's message to me said, 'Done.' He is genuine."

Despite the LIONs' differences in networking philosophy with LinkedIn, Burda hopes the two groupscan get along. He talks about the social network's future with great passion, noting the likelihood of anIPO and future growth.

"People sometimes think 'open networker' means you're a spammer," he says. "But for me, that's nottrue. I value my people and value my connections. There are bad apples who come in, sure, but ingeneral people often just want to help each other. It makes me feel great about what I'm doing."

© 2008 CXO Media Inc.


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LinkedIn Most Unusual Members - Meet the Super-Connected - StevenBurda

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