The @LinkedIn video: How to get a job at @Flipkart

So my colleague Vamsi and I were interviewed by folks at LinkedIn as part of their campaign with MTV India's #GetAJob on what it takes to get a job at Flipkart using LinkedIn

So here's the video :)

The 3000th blog post - reflections on 13 years of blogging

So I thought I would blog on something special for this post, but then I realised that maybe this should just be a "looking back" post. And as my friend Steve Levy suggested on Twitter

@GautamGhosh Or you can write about the pros & cons of being an early adopter of anything #HRtech – imagine getting into LinkedIn today
— Steve Levy (@LevyRecruits) March 24, 2015

I wandered into blogging by accident - as I guess most of us who discovered blogging in 2002 did. The pros outweighed the cons. You were part of a small community of bloggers and read each other's blog posts.

Being part of a early adopter community - like joining LinkedIn in 2002, or trying Yammer in 2008 ensure that you build connections easily and feel part of an "elite club", but the cons are that the tools are often not very evolved, and things that you want take time to be built into it - if at all.

Often the needs of the product change from users to revenue and the product changes and most of the early adopters like it. Sometimes the changes are triggered to make the product useful for the "normal" population which the early adopters don't agree with. It's a tricky balance. Saw it in the case of LinkedIn and also Twitter.

And here's an interview that my friend Jim Stroud did of me some 8 years ago - where I talk about how I got blogging

Stop the spam on LinkedIn !

I loved LinkedIn. Really. I was an early adopter. My membership number is 18770. (you can find yours by going to your profile page - it's the number after https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id= )

I was on LinkedIn before you had profile pics :) But I am getting nostalgic about the good ol' days.

But of late, many people are falling for spam on LinkedIn. No, I don't mean those mathematical puzzles (though they are irritating too) or "see the letters and the first word will tell.." (ditto). If you're a connection of mine that responds to either one of those there's only one thing I do, I hide your update - that means I will never ever see any update from you. Yep.

This post however is to entreat you not to fall for stupid, idiotic spams like these database building spam posts

Almost 40,000 people have given their mobile numbers to enter a WhatsApp group? Don't people know the limit for a WhatsApp group?

And then there's this. Makes me wonder about basic intelligence of people. No words to express my disappointment!

Please please don't ruin the LinkedIn experience for everyone.