Greylock VC and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman talked about his Web 3.0 idea (Big Data quel surprise) here at Web 2.0 about the implementation layer on top of this data. When asked by moderator John Battelle what he thought about his own investment (and what some might consider a competitor) Facebook, Hoffman said, “Not everything has to be social,” he said “Facebook has a lot of huge things to do,” saying the interest lies in figuring out how to do that.
Hoffman then listed the current prominent “social” platforms, “Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter … and a fourth thing.” He expressed the most hope about the fourth thing, “It’s the creation of he new things that’s stunning and different and interesting.”
Hoffman was steadfast in his idea that LinkedIn is a one of the cool kids. When Information Week’s David Carr prefaced asking Hoffman a question by, “LinkedIn is for old people,” Hoffman snapped back wittily, “Like the people that would give you a job?”
Carr went on to argue that young people already have established a social identity on Facebook, and have no need to join linkedIn. “We actually do reach a younger demographic,” Hoffman responded, citing statistics he couldn’t reveal. What he could reveal? That the social network is now adding “2 members per second.”
“My daughter is on LinkedIn …,” the next person in the Q&A told Hoffman, reinforcing his point.
David Carr: People say LinkedIn is for old people. Reid Hoffman response: like the people who will give you a job?—
Kay Luo (@kluo) October 19, 2011
With over 100 million users representing over 200 countries around the world, LinkedIn is a fast-growing professional networking site that allows members to create business contacts, search for jobs, and find potential clients. Individuals have the ability to create their own professional profile that can be viewed by others in their network, and also view the profiles of their own contacts. Competitors to LinkedIn include sites such as XING, Doostang and Ecademy. Of note, LinkedIn won...
Reid Hoffman is a Partner at Greylock, and Co-Founder and Executive Chairman at LinkedIn. Reid joined Greylock Partners in 2009. His areas of focus include consumer Internet, enterprise 2.0, mobile, social gaming, online marketplaces, payments, and social networks. Reid likes to work with products that can reach hundreds of millions of participants and businesses that have network effects. An accomplished entrepreneur, executive and angel investor, Hoffman has played an integral part in building many of today’s leading consumer technology...
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