Phil Yanov's dashboard

I'm not saying this fixes the problem, but, it is a reasonable workaround for the time being. You can export your entire member list in a spreadsheet format easily imported to your spreadsheet editor of choice where the member data can be sorted as you would like. I have resorted to this for now. – Van, on October 14, 2008 19:55

I'm not saying this fixes the problem, but, it is a reasonable workaround for the time being. You can export your entire member list in a spreadsheet format easily imported to your spreadsheet editor of choice where the member data can be sorted as you would like. I have resorted to this for now. – Van, on October 14, 2008 19:54

I manage 2 groups and am not a paying member. I can still click on prospective members and see their profiles.

But it's been TWO MONTHS since the "great linkedin group fiasco of 2008" and we still don't have most of the functionality that we lost in the changeover, despite the commitments that were made to fix these issues.

I still can't select the number of members to see on a page. I still can't sore the member list by date joined, by member name, or by email address. The default sort order, by connection to me and total connections is totally useless for managing a group.

linkedin's customer support was always worthless. Now I'm losing faith in the employees that participate in this forum.

Luke, can you sort your list? I thought the sort feature was going to be a part of LinkedIn. I cannot sort. There is no alphabetical listing. This is more than unhelpful to me - but I am guessing I am the only one with this problem. – Aneta Bereda, on October 14, 2008 11:45

Luke, can you sort your list? I thought the sort feature was going to be a part of LinkedIn. I cannot sort. There is no alphabetical listing. This is more than unhelpful to me - but I am guessing I am the only one with this problem. – Aneta Bereda, on October 14, 2008 11:45

Is anyone out there running a group who is not paying Linkedin membership. I don't and up until now hadn't thought about it. Now as of a day or two ago I cant see my "requests to join" profiles. How as a group manager can I ascertain the validity of my members if I cant see their profiles? Cant Linkedin modify their software to allow group managers to see profiles of the "requests to join?"

Have I missed it?
Is the sort feature off the table?

Search is not Sort. Not even sorta.

It's been 2 weeks since Allen posted his bug fix timetable. Two of the "this week" or "next week" issues remain.

1) I still have group members with null joined dates

2) I still only get 20 members per page, with no option to increase this to 50-1000.

And while the new member function seems to be working, those users that thought they joined when it was broken still don't show up, and probably don't realize that their join requests got lost. Is there any way to notify these users that they have to try it again.?

I guess this is a final, lonely comment on this topic - though it has not been resolved, IMHO. The topic seems forgotten or ignored, like the wisdom of grand parents, but it needs to be repeated clearly: the sort by date was one of the most useful features in organization management..

1 - The sort feature is still broken, and it is the bestest broken I never saw.

The sort now works by degree and connections. None of this alphabetical or chronological filing: 52-pick-up is the new organization. This sort holds all the excitement of watching a Florida dog race from a retirement-home rocker and less of the pay off.

There is a Search Members feature to help me welcome new members. Putting the words "new members" into the search fields does not help me but hey, I tried it just in case it was a joke. (Yeah, the promise was that it would be restored.)

At the "Requests To Join," which usually acts as a holding cell for the many requests that do not quite make the grade at the moment, I can watch the same dog race as these names jostle for first position in their respective categories: Show (or 2nd Degree) and Place (3rd Degree). They move according to the number of connections they have.

2 - The "Joined On" information is spotty. I have no idea why this function does not work uniform and I have no idea when it happenned. All I know is that I have no idea when some people joined and why some people get a date stamp and others do not Weep for the loss of data integrity.

The "Requested On" is uniform. I mean in a good way.

3 - The "Members Withdrawn" list was useful. I used it once after 1% of members withdrew, sending them an email to them asking if all was well. This good feature had the potential to provide an early warning flag because, had these withdrawn members been harrassed by current members, I could have improved the group.

Under the current sort/random shuffle function, I can no longer even note who withdrew. Running a forum, which holds conversations in the open in case someone does not know what is a forum/BBS, I have seen some laughable breeches in Nettiquette like when a new member spammed people using Private Message. The new member had just joined and spammed everyone with a question rather than post it once on the forum board. So, nothing would surprise me as to give cause to leave a group.

And the surprises that this topic has brought out have not been pleasant or entirely resolved.

My work-around for this has been to use forwarding so that Sandy's e-mail reminders end up in multiple inboxes...thus increasing the likelihood that I'm going to see them when I need them. – Shazzer, on August 31, 2008 19:08

Quick note: I started a new thread specifically for the New LinkedIn Groups "Discussion Feature" Issues - please click here to go that thread...

So, now we have the discussion feature. And websites are shunted into a group's "profile." Do you suppose websites will be the next rationalization: websites made redundant?

In typical LinkedIn fashion, no explanation was given how the new feature works. So we posted a call to group members to participate in a dummy discussion, and the discussion feature appears to function much like a forum, except without a forum's quote feature and there is a big caveat emptor: comments can disappear when the commentor deletes his/her comment. That should be good for a flame war. Nothing like plausible deniability to motivate a hothead from acting first and thinking..... later.

Hands up: who wants to look stupid?

Also, comments return to 1) the INBOX, 2) the email associated to the LinkedIn account and 3) to the comment feature. Nothing like a powerful question to drive the IT administrator crazy. We need more disk space. (Yes, it is time I got a Yahoo/Gmail account and stopped using the company email.)

Currently there is a bug - I hope it is a bug - that prevents replies via INBOX (I am refering to the home page tally list of unreplied mail). So these unreplied messages need to be archived and the messages sent to email deleted. Replies can be made via the "comment" feature. Sorry MeatLoaf but "One out of three ain't bad" where LinkedIn is at today.

And we have a mighty 200 characters with which to start a discussion. No html for source material or a YouTube link.

All in all, not much functionability when compared to what we currently offer our groups through the remote forums we run for them. Remore forums provide networking through archived information; interactive discussions; a rich web 2.0 environment; the Private Message feature; the ability for posters to hide their email but identify themself; selectively track discussions online; etc. This description is just in case someone does not know what a forum is/offers.

The LinkedIn discussion feature is no match to even a free forum. Plus the feature makes it annoying to be a member of 19 groups and have real-time discussions show up on the LinkedIn home page for all 19 groups. This takes away from my keeping efficient contact with my contacts' changes and, ultimately, my personal networking effectiveness on LinkedIN.

I only hope that the old feature publicizing a "non-LinkedIn" website will remain alongside the poorer "discussion" feature. Remote websites and forums are valuable and generous resources to online groups. See what I mean here (plug): www.thecanadianexpat.com

Really, take a quick look and imagine what it offers the target community. No way is LInkedIn going to have bandwidth for that. And what you will see at the link, as modest as it is, outweighs the new discussion feature 10:1.

Maybe you share my opinion? Or have I missed something that the discussion feature offers that is new? Remember, I live in the country Hitler generously "liberated" prior to the freedom extended to us by the Soviet Union - so I am non-plused by being given things (like freedom) I already have and I am wary about losing the things I had (freedom) in place of the gifts being given.

Aneta – Aneta Bereda, on August 29, 2008 17:48

So, now we have the discussion feature. And websites are shunted into a group's "profile." Do you suppose websites will be the next rationalization: websites made redundant?

In typical LinkedIn fashion, no explanation was given how the new feature works. So we posted a call to group members to participate in a dummy discussion, and the discussion feature appears to function much like a forum, except without a forum's quote feature and there is a big caveat emptor: comments can disappear when the commentor deletes his/her comment. That should be good for a flame war. Nothing like plausible deniability to motivate a hothead from acting first and thinking..... later.

Hands up: who wants to look stupid?

Also, comments return to 1) the INBOX, 2) the email associated to the LinkedIn account and 3) to the comment feature. Nothing like a powerful question to drive the IT administrator crazy. We need more disk space. (Yes, it is time I got a Yahoo/Gmail account and stopped using the company email.)

Currently there is a bug - I hope it is a bug - that prevents replies via INBOX (I am refering to the home page tally list of unreplied mail). So these unreplied messages need to be archived and the messages sent to email deleted. Replies can be made via the "comment" feature. Sorry MeatLoaf but "One out of three ain't bad" where LinkedIn is at today.

And we have a mighty 200 characters with which to start a discussion. No html for source material or a YouTube link.

All in all, not much functionability when compared to what we currently offer our groups through the remote forums we run for them. Remore forums provide networking through archived information; interactive discussions; a rich web 2.0 environment; the Private Message feature; the ability for posters to hide their email but identify themself; selectively track discussions online; etc. This description is just in case someone does not know what a forum is/offers.

The LinkedIn discussion feature is no match to even a free forum. Plus the feature makes it annoying to be a member of 19 groups and have real-time discussions show up on the LinkedIn home page for all 19 groups. This takes away from my keeping efficient contact with my contacts' changes and, ultimately, my personal networking effectiveness on LinkedIN.

I only hope that the old feature publicizing a "non-LinkedIn" website will remain alongside the poorer "discussion" feature. Remote websites and forums are valuable and generous resources to online groups. See what I mean here (plug): www.thecanadianexpat.com

Really, take a quick look and imagine what it offers the target community. No way is LInkedIn going to have bandwidth for that. And what you will see at the link, as modest as it is, outweighs the new discussion feature 10:1.

Maybe you share my opinion? Or have I missed something that the discussion feature offers that is new? Remember, I live in the country Hitler generously "liberated" prior to the freedom extended to us by the Soviet Union - so I am non-plused by being given things (like freedom) I already have and I am wary about losing the things I had (freedom) in place of the gifts being given.

Aneta

This isn't actually a new problem, but something I just tried. The two groups I manage are geographically restricted to the USA, but not to any one city. The option to restrict membership requires a zip code.

I've already got a few requests to join them from folks around the globe.

Once all the new group problems are fixed, could you consider expanding the geography option to restrict by country, and perhaps by state, in addition to the major city level.

>>>>interpretation of me posting the Black Hat video<<< lex, you mean to say you did not intend the posting as advertising on a MicroSoft site? - Aneta – Aneta Bereda, on August 27, 2008 13:16

In the same day (yesterday) I recieved two emails from LinkedIn. The first informed me that my 2,000 member group was removed for being associated with a site hosting a video "encouraging people to hack LinkedIn". The second email was the one iniviting me as a group manager to try out fabulous new group capabilities. That in itself is amazing but the part that surprised me the most was LinkedIn's paranoid interpretation of me posting the Black Hat video as being hostile. The fact that I posted it to raise user awareness never crossed their mind I guess. Well, I sill have six groups on LinkedIn and I can't wait to start investing my time and energy into enhancing LinkedIn users' experience using fantastic new group capabilities. Discussions eh? Somebody's on the wrong track here.

It seems words will trump deeds and then spur a really bad reaction when people realize the betrayal they feel is from their own rush to judgement. I received the same email as cactus (and you did) estolling the future.

Should we wait and see if this solves the problem before we celebrate and disband? I live in Poland and, well, what would have happened if the success of D-Day was good enough in Wolrd War 2? You know: Peace in our time. I do not know what you guys think about groups and how they _should_ work but my firm runs two websites and outsources a third for groups. The forums encourage grouip conversation rather than the cubicle blogging of Q&A.

Does anyone have the time to respond to 350 individual responses and CARRY ON INDIVIDUAL DIALOGUES with all when a forum atmosphere will build and jell the community (rather than a full time band leader)? One Question on Q&A has generated over 350 responses. Others are merely in the lower hundreds....

I wonder if this will be the communications architecture being offered? Do you know, cactus...?

So, it's nice that LinkedIn plans to give me what I already have got going while it has taken away what was useful. (Nothing like redundancy at the cost of functionality to warm my heart.) And the people who think this is great now were not running "group communities," IMHO. They were selling group badges on LinkedIN.

And, yes, one group we run is a professional group. And, no, there are no flame wars. Amazing how having a simple control like requiring a real name and company email address solves the problems of trolls and hot-heads.

So, with all due respect to cactus, this problem is not solved until the fat lady sings - or we risk deja vu all over again. Just ask any fireman what he thinks about turning his back on a fire. Let's not jump the gun on this "solved" status just yet

Aneta

Went to every group owner and manager

First, thank you for managing your group on LinkedIn. We sincerely appreciate the time and effort you devote to your members, and we know they value it. Together you have made Groups one of the top features on LinkedIn.

This Friday, we will be adding several much-requested features to your group:

* Discussion forums: Simple discussion spaces for you and your members. (You can turn discussions off in your management control panel if you like.)

* Enhanced roster: Searchable list of group members.

* Digest emails: Daily or weekly digests of new discussion topics which your members may choose to receive. (We will be turning digests on for all current group members soon, and prompting them to set to their own preference.)

* Group home page: A private space for your members on LinkedIn.

We're confident that these new features will spur communication, promote collaboration, and make your group more valuable to you and your members. We hope you can come by LinkedIn on Friday morning to check out the new functionality and get a group discussion going by posting a welcome message.

Sincerely,
The LinkedIn Groups Team

My group of 1,900 users simply vanished. My attempts to get LinkedIn to explain the situation have been unsuccessful other than the response informing me that they are working on it. Getting 1,900 members costs time and money and I am definitely looking for other options out there. – Alexander.george@yahoo.com, on August 24, 2008 07:22

Hi Bob. Please see a separate post in response to your request for the links. The comments don't allow html so I had to create a separate post. – Luke Grange, on August 23, 2008 01:49