Ask Dave Taylor: Tech and Business

Saturday

LinkedIn announces new InMail service

LinkedIn CEO Reid Hoffman announced an interesting new feature of the LinkedIn service, InMail. The biggest improvement? You can finally -- finally! -- search outside of your own network. Of course, there's now also a paid membership option ($15/month), but unlike Meetup.com, there's still a free membership option. Smart move. There are user interface changes that'll take a bit of getting used to, a new tab, and lots more.

For two years, we’ve been building a new kind of business tool, one that lets you benefit from and enhance professional relationships that matter. This summer, we’re taking several more steps toward making LinkedIn an essential resource for you.

New Name Search: All of LinkedIn for Every User.

We’re introducing the best professional search on the Web. Now when you search for someone by name, you’ll get results from the entire LinkedIn Network of more than 3.3 million registered professionals. And we’ve improved People search, too — you’ll see not only matching professionals in your network, but also the top results from the entire LinkedIn Network.

Introductions: Greater Trust and Speed

Overwhelmingly, users have told us that four-degree referrals take too long and require too many people to get the real benefit of a referred introduction. We agree. Introductions, our new name for Contact Requests, will now extend only three degrees. Everyone in an Introduction chain will know either...