Clay Shirky posted a really interesting article on Many to Many today – “Hot Tubbing an Online Community”

No.. this has nothing to do with getting online community people together in a hottub. Read it – it’s fascinating (particularly to those interested in what to do when a community gets too large).

After waking at an absurdly early hour this morning, i briefly checked in with various blogs that i check in with only to find Liz’s bet. Of course, it got me all contemplative, at 8AM and then i remembered that i was up at that hour to go to a meeting and had to rush off before being able to articulate why i think that Liz is correct – in 3 months time, women will represent only 10% of the participants in the top 500 of those on LinkedIn.

Frankly, i’d extend her bet to include all marginalized populations in the business structure (people of color, queer folks, etc.). I would bank that these populations would be farther underrepresented on LinkedIn than they are in the real world (where they are poorly represented to begin with). Personally, i believe that genuine changes are needed for LinkedIn to be widely effective.

In an ideal world, we’d live in a meritocratic society where someone’s value in the job process is based on their previous jobs, which are inherently based on skills. But we don’t live in that world. We live in one where social networks are everything. LinkedIn appears to be trying to allow people to find each other through their merits (under the assumption that you are connected) and then give you the the social network to contact that person; normally, this is done the other way around.

The problem is that their approach emphasizes a limited perspective of the individual. There is no consideration for a person’s education, their personal interests, or most of all, presenting their character. The only character component is through the linkages. Since character is determined through linkages, you have to decide to request an introduction before you figure out through which path they are connected. This is problematic because people rely on their assessment of my friends’ expertise to evaluate whether or not they would trust their opinion of a friend. While my HR friends could help me find a great HR person, i wouldn’t trust their opinion on a programmer.

This is not specific to LinkedIn or job markets. In Friendster, i have added many people whose friends i would be wary of dating. On the other hand, through surfing the system, people whose friends i would automatically discount seemed to shed new light on my friend. But it is unreasonable to assume that i would trust any of my connection’s connections.

LinkedIn does not allow you to navigate the structure. They see this as a feature, but i see it as a fatal flaw. Women, minorities and other underrepresented groups are notorious high self-monitors. Generally speaking, they are unlikely to put themselves out blindly, to cold call or to message someone without knowing the path that they’re dealing with. They are unlikely to evaluate and then approach someone simply through their self-professed professional listing. There are no testimonials, no validation of the individual ahead of time. Mostly, there’s little to grasp onto other than jobl listings. (Women are notorious for getting to know a potential employee/collaborator on topics other than work to get a common grounding for power purposes.) Yet, the biggest problem is that the mechanism for surfing the network emphasizes one’s numerical worth because the system lists people in order of their number of connections. Searching based on anything meaningful is impossible; you can’t even search by name to find out if a known friend is on the system. Frankly, most women don’t feel the need to show their worth numerically, and often feel slighted in a situation where they are expected to.

Jessica argues that one of the problems is that networks are self-selecting. I would agree with her, but Friendster reminds me that women are quite comfortable inviting people and connecting them, but the first priority is social (although i’ve noticed that friends of mine have found job connections on Friendster as well as dates). For women, the social is inherently part of the professional. The problem is the format, the UI, the feeling that the system presents. My female friends were by far the more viral in their habits on Friendster than my male friends. Yet, even the most viral Friendster female friend of mine got bored and annoyed with LinkedIn within moments and hasn’t logged back in since.

I suspect that, even with effort in inviting women, LinkedIn has little appeal for women. They are the most sufficient at negotiating their social networks, but they do so systematically and via the network first.