Wikipedians on LinkedIn.
This is the Wikipedians group on LinkedIn as run by Wikipedians.
This is not — the guy running it has stated in private emails that he is running it for “networking,” which in practice appears to mean spam blasts. I suggest avoiding it.
(If you add me on LinkedIn with the link being Wikipedia/Wikimedia, I’ll probably add you back eventually when I get around to it.)
April 16th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
You can leave the spammy group by going to the page http://www.linkedin.com/groupRegistration (while logged in) and clicking “Leave group” link under “Wikipedia Users Group”.
April 18th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
David, for some reason I couldn’t connect to the “official” LinkedIn Wikipedian group.
On the other hand, there is another InkedIn Wikipedia group run by Wikipedians here — although so far it’s not been very active. (Pete & I just have not had the time to do much with it.)
Geoff
April 18th, 2009 at 7:51 pm
And I couldn’t connect to your group either just now … when not logged in it said the group was no longer active, when logged in it says “There was an unexpected problem that prevented us from completing your request.” I assume all is less than well right now …
April 18th, 2009 at 8:26 pm
Unfortunately that group has the first mover advantage. I too initially joined it for being the largest, then left it afterwards.
OTOH, there are way too many wikipedia/wikimedia-related groups on LinkedIn; I’ve suggested before to merge the ones that obviously overlap in scope, but it seems people don’t care much. Here’s the link to that discussion (in the Wikimedia Foundation group), I hope it works for you: http://www.linkedin.com/groupAnswers?viewQuestionAndAnswers=&gid=158280&discussionID=267258
April 19th, 2009 at 12:39 am
I just had another look at my Wikipedia group, & there’s a note stating “Group status suspended” — which explains part of what David encountered. However, this is the first I heard that it was not active. (Another LinkedIn group I belong to whose activity is about as low — ” 10th Mountain Division Descendants” — is active & apparently okay.)
Geoff
April 25th, 2009 at 4:06 am
I’m registered there, but I never go - I have so much trouble keeping up with my Facebook. Love your blog, David.
May 14th, 2009 at 5:53 pm
My group was suspended as well and succeeded to get it back online with the help of some officials. Just to keep an eye on it I stay memeber of some more groups.
Question is: What is the most official group?
May 14th, 2009 at 6:42 pm
Good question! The above-warned group was not a sincere Wikipedians group, but there are at least a couple that are sincere … we need an on-wiki list somewhere on Meta, I’d suggest.
May 16th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
Great idea, David. It’s been some time I was on Meta. I have very few influence there. I’m just a simple translator en-nl and nl-en.
July 17th, 2009 at 3:10 am
The “evil” group seems to be owned by Jimbo… or is this a hoax?
July 21st, 2009 at 12:10 pm
Indeed, many of the wikipedia-related groups on linkedin seem to be owned by Jimmy Wales now, including the original (and largest) “evil” group. I wonder if he asked the group owners individually, or requested that to LinkedIn’s admins. In any case, I think this is an excellent opportunity to merge the groups! I joined the largest group, and will suggest that sometime soon.
Btw, the logo for the “evil” group is set to a rubik’s cube, I wonder why (especially since many other groups use the wikipedia logo