LinkedIn has launched its new OpenSocial-based application platform called InApps – an answer to the platforms found on social networks like Facebook and MySpace, but without the clutter and “junk” apps that plague those sites. Unlike most other social networks, LinkedIn apps must go through an approval process before they will go live on the store, and all apps must be deemed “professional” in purpose to appear on the business-oriented social network. To prevent an overwhelming amount of clutter, users will be restricted to including a maximum of 15 applications on their main profile pages, though they will eventually have the option to install more apps on a separate page.
Beyond the quality assurance process, LinkedIn is also limiting the flexibility apps will have when it comes to monetization. Apps won’t be allowed to use third party ad networks – instead, they’ll have to work with LinkedIn’s ad system. For now applications will only have access to LinkedIn’s current ad inventory, which could make targeting ads less effective (though it sounds like there will be more options for targeted ads in the future). Apps will still be allowed to charge users for individual goods, and can also implement a paid subscription service (launch partner Box.net is using this model).
At launch available applications include a trip application from TripIt, presentations from SlideShare and Google Presentations, blog feeds from WordPress and Six Apart, file storage and collaboration from Box.net, online workspaces from Huddle, and a Reading List app from Amazon that will allow users to share the books they are reading. LinkedIn is also offering a few homebrewed apps, including a tracking application that monitors for a company’s mentions on Twitter and a Poll app. You can see demonstrations of each application available in the videos below:
Overview
Slideshare
Tripit
Amazon
Typepad
Box
Huddle
Wordpress
Company Buzz
LinkedIn is really stressing the quality…not a bad thing I guess
Not trying to spam, but if you want to read one line snips about each of the apps without having to watch all the videos, head to tinyComb.com
-jason
thanks tinycomb jason. Just added you to my reader.
For the life of me, I can’t understand the attraction of LinkedIn.
I worked for decades to reach out to people and compile a “Rolodex” in my brain of contacts. To me, this is one of the greatest assets that I have in the business world.
Why would I want to hand it over to an outside service?
–
Early on, I perused a service – I won’t mention their name – maybe LinkedIn, maybe not – to see one of my competitor’s contacts. He had apparently uploaded through an automated tool – probably his whole Outlook Address book. What a goldmine!
I don’t like the revenue model for this.
I’m hoping this won’t affect or replace LinkedIn’s OpenSocial integration. In June it sounded like they were still planning on doing OpenSocial via Shindig – http://blog.lin...e-io-confe.html .
Steve poses a good question – anybody know their continued involvement with OpenSocial? I was encouraged they were moving in that direction.
It’s based on the OpenSocial platform (added this to the post).
lol they are trying everything to get their company to be worth 1 billion. sorry it willnt happening .no one with commonsense who would purchase it for >1 billion. comcast may buy it for billion since they are known as biggest suckers in the valley.
wordpress/techcrunch needs an edit feature like right now lol
lol wordpress needs fewer moron posters lol add something to the conversation lol
whatever i clearly added that linkedin wasn’t worth 1 billion at validation to me. the only company that would be crazy enough to buy them that high would be comcast, since they are known to overspend for nearly everything. but you the dummy which you are clearly no denying it bud paid more attention to me asking for an edit function to correct a few simple errors that happens to the best of us due to oversight.
btw lol @ anyone named waggoonerrrrrrrr calling me out lol
Are you really making fun of someone’s name? Like that is relevant?
Despite your ‘very insightful’ comment that LI isn’t worth $1B, you never justified that opinion (eg. biz model sucks). All you did is take the opportunity to tell everyone your opinion of Comcast’s reputation in the valley.
The move to limit third party advertisers is a good one. This will allow them to build their own ad network and keep control of the ads they allow on the site. From an advertiser prospective this just means that there will be more places for my ads to show up and will ensure that the quality will stay on the same level.
If you want to target the business class the Linkedin network would be a good place to start.
I like the direction where it’s headed. About time to get into the game.
LinkedIn is by far my most valuable social network, primarily because of the cost of getting connected and the implications it has for my professional networking.
I’m glad they’re keeping the quality high, it will make it a more useful site but prevent it becoming cheap and nasty like Facebook.
Linked In has become almost impossible for us to use in recent weeks here in Oz – up to 40 seconds per page load. Anyone getting that up in the northern hemisphere? I haven’t seen any reports of it.
The app container is indeed built on OpenSocial!
It’s very excited that this has launched and that we can finally see the app we worked on (SlideShare for LinkedIn) live on the site. I think LinkedIn is going to be the most important OpenSocial platform yet, give the professional nature of LinkedIn’s user base.
LinkedIn is trying to get rich by earning billions of dollars.But it will take time to get this.
Indian Blogger
http://www.iboozi.com
Let me get this straight, “get rich by earning biilions”? Holy $h!t, these guy’s must be smart.
Hi! Do you know of anybody at LinkedIn who’s in charge or can lead me to the person in-charge of Asia Pacific, or ASEAN in particular? Thanks.
..why does Linkedin have such a crappy user experience and look like it was designed in the late 90s..this despite millions in funding and over 300 headcount.
Well, they must be doing something right with 30m users. What don’t you like about their design?
30m users and active users makes a big difference at LinkedIn. Last I read, LinkedIn retention rate is close to 40% only.
I must agree on the design. LinkedIn has long known for their 1.0 design and bad user interface.
Well done LinkedIn. I think this will be a great way for LinkedIn to speed up its pace of innovation – by letting (but carefully controlling) what apps can appear within LinkedIn. A great move for them – and a strong start to their platform. Congrats Reid and team!
Very impressive. The quality approach to apps is the only way to go for them. I was immediately interested in each of the featured apps. Nice work Linkedin crew!! I can see myself using the service a whole lot more now.
@nemrut
The word on the street is that they have a really crazy Java app.. IE.. it takes 8 hours just to do a build! I can’t even imagine why its so crazy, or why it takes that long… I have been involved with/built some very big Java apps and haven’t ever seen a build time above a few minutes on a normal workstation (as long as the unit tests were disabled). It’s so f’ed up that rather than write new classes, they just stuff whatever they need to do all in one big class because it’s too painful to wait the 8 hours for a new build.
Supposedly they are working on a new architecture, but it’s somewhere I would stay away from as a Software Engineer unless I was working on the new stuff. Painful!
http://devnulled.com
Brandon, check out: http://hurvitz....in-architecture
Pretty impressive numbers, and, they are using some pretty impressive caching and warehousing techniques.
But yeah, and 8 hour build is way too long. Would love to hear more about it, as that’s pretty hard to believe
LinkedIn is a boring but useful collection of information of professionals. In such a network that is typically visited once a month or less, I am not sure if the concept of applications will ever catch on. When I am in LinkedIn, I am there to check out where my friends work or to send an email to a contact. I am not there seeking to be entertained. An application that would be suitable for Linkedin is OFFICEBOOK (currently on FB). OfficeBook allows users to check the culture of an organization and also see which companies offer a culture that match your own values. (http://apps.fac...com/office-book)
I’m happy to see LinkedIn trying out new ideas, and they seem to be focusing on applications that are have professional value, rather than the frivolous apps that I associate with Facebook. I just hope their sluggish / buggy performance today is a temporary glitch.
8 hours thats it…at one of my previous companies (hint they sell books online in Seattle ) it used to take over 12 hours to build their monolithic cpp binary!
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From an active LinkedIn user’s perspective, I am very excited about the addition of apps to the LinkedIn Network. I can’t wait to get to work in the morning to add a few of them to my profile.
Boris Epstein
http://www.thewebwar.com
I hope their application implementation will not be as bad as their main site filled with bugs and bad interface. Just tried the wordpress app and already getting few errors. I hope it is a traffic issue but then again as a LinkedIn user, we have been trained to live in an imperfect world/site.
@Desi
Ouch! I think I ran across a blog of someone who started there when it was really small and he was blogging about some of their initial tech. I got the impression from his blog that their CPP code was gone now, but who knows. I’ll have to figure out where I bookmarked that blog because it was pretty interesting.
http://devnulled.com
Just for the record, there is another aspiring professional network that integrates apps for network based collaboration – our own SmibsNet. TC recently gave out invite keys for our beta. The difference? No ads, beautiful profiles and portfolios for creative professionals and elegant applications that help small businesses Grow Smart. Let me know what you think once you’ve tried both approaches.
Thanks for hijacking the post.
it a very good idea, but what took them so long?
Great stuff man done by LinkedIn Team
http://www.bizimunda.net
All I can say is that linkedin is good for getting things done through your contacts. Besides that there is no real use. The app platform is also less attractive and the applications with the exception of Tripit and Amazon reader are garbage. Why would you want to use a third party networking service to share files and create and share presentations there. THey should stick with what they do best.
Ning recently eviscerated their platform in favor of OpenSocial applications and I wasn’t happy with the change because it replaced customizable functionality with crappy widgets like BuddyPoke (sounds gay). At least LinkedIn manage to find or build some useful OpenSocial applications. I’m considering contributing a video plugin to Elgg in order to create a decent platform for social networking incorporating vlogging.
It’s really too bad that applications like these never had much success on Facebook. Perhaps it simply reflects the market share that exist on each network and illustrates how Facebook really still isn’t a business network, despite making some inroads there, but really still a personal network instead.
When is LinkedIn going to stop copying everything that Facebook does (12-18 months later) and actually start innovating?
app platform for what? i guess they don’t know what to do with the money they got…fb apps are dying by the second…what apps can work on linkedin where ppl never login!!!
I don’t think that it would be a great success…
Just wanted to say thanks you guys have developed a great business system which is helping me every day.
Cheers
jason