Social Networking: With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility

It has come to my attention through a question posted on LinkedIn by one of my connections, that many other networking sites use deceptive methods to build a user base.

For example, Visible Path, allows you to import your contacts. Great, LinkedIn allows you to do the same. Here is the catch, when say my friend, John Doe, decides to sign up, he imports his contacts. Me being one of those contacts, is now searchable on Visible Path's website. The person that views my info in the search results, is not aware that I am not a member or user of Visible Path, he sends an invitation to join networks.

Personally, I feel that this method is deceptive, sneaky and unacceptable. As it becomes more and more difficult to keep secure our identities, we do not need social websites using irresponsible methods to grow their business.

My connection on LinkedIn had the pleasure of receiving this response from a VP at Visible Path:

Jane Doe,

Lynda Radosevich, here, VP of Communications for Visible Path. Thanks for your questions and feedback, and for the passionate discussion your post has sparked.

You make a good point--one about which we’ve been talking internally at Visible Path --that it would be helpful for Visible Path subscribers to see more clearly who is a current subscriber and who is not when sending connection requests. We definitely plan to make this change soon, we and understand your concerns.

I’d also like to address some of the responses you received by providing a little more information about Visible Path.

Our ultimate goal is to help people see the big picture when it comes to their network of connections and to help them share connections intelligently with other people they know and trust. When people sign up and download the Outlook plug-in, Visible Path creates a visual depiction of their connections so they can see how strong their relationships are relative to each other. The system’s privacy controls make sure people’s relationships and their contact information remain hidden. Our intention is to provide a comprehensive view of who subscribers really know (based on the information gleaned, for now, from Outlook), and how close those connections are. And, in order to show the most accurate picture, we include folks who are currently using Visible Path, as well as those who are not.

Your name appears in a Visible Path search because one or more Visible Path subscribers know you. Only the people that know you (or already know your email address) can connect to you, and only the people that know you can introduce someone they know to you. And if that person wants to introduce someone they know you to you, Visible Path sends you an email to make sure that you’d welcome the introduction. Ideally, this offers people all the privacy and control of the real world, and an even better way to connect.

To people using Visible Path, it's not the size of network that matters but the quality of the relationships within that network. Anything we can do to help improve that experience is very important to us, so thanks again for bringing your concerns to our attention.

Regards,

Lynda Radosevich
Visible Path

My thoughts regarding Lynda's response are simple really.

One, how many times have you gone to a mixer and there is atleast one person just hoarding business cards...I have a strong feeling that they use a site similar to Visible Path. How can Visible Path honestly control what they state as "Quality Relationships", since there is no way for you to disallow someone to add you.

Two, if John Doe performs a search, and finds my name, how difficult do you think it would be for him to find an email address for me that works? Unfortunately for me, and just about every professional that promotes themselves using the internet, hiding your email address is nearly impossible. It is somewhere and with the power that is Google, it is not hidden by any means.

Lastly, it is a fallacy if you believe that it is not Visible Path's goal to grow their network as large as possible. If they didn't they would not be able to attract investors, advertisers, or large endorsements.

Despite Lynda's best PR efforts, this is a losing battle for her regarding our privacy.

When it comes to privacy, I live by Ben Parker's quote from the first Spiderman. "With great power, comes great responsibility".