networking, or money for friendship?

April 6, 2004 2:55 PM

Bay Area Link Up is a social/business networking site for professionals in the Bay Area. Some use it for business networking and getting freelance work. Others use it for other reasons. They've recently expanded to other regions (and also added a monthly fee). I like this model better than Yahoo Groups or Usenet, simply because people create events that you can sign up for if they interest you. What online networking groups do you like to use?
posted by culberjo (4 comments total)

[obvious] craigslist
posted by badstone at 3:24 PM on April 6, 2004

"A phone number is required in the application process because we often need to complete a phone interview before accepting a new member."

Uh.

Anyway, has "online networking" actually worked for anyone? I was just giving some advice on monkeyfilter about freelancing--that to make any real go of it, you have to know people. Like, networking with real people in meatspace, and not profiles you've clickity-clicked on the web.

hi. welcome to my first comment! i kiss you!!
posted by danny the boy at 4:56 PM on April 6, 2004

funny, i moved to the bay area a few months ago and have never heard of bay area link up but find that EVERYONE uses craigslist. So far i've found an apartment, met my girlfriend, bought a car and nearly sold a (seperate) car from craigslist (oh, and ad to that i got a t-shirt from them (actually cafepress) with the name misspelled "craiglist"). best damn free service on the planet.
posted by NGnerd at 9:05 PM on April 6, 2004

get them to teach you to spell then, start with 'add' ;-)

seriously, oh, Danny boy, has this network ever worked for you? I mean where's this global village? How come there's no speed limit on the information superhighway, and damn it - does it go N/S or E/W?!?

as a freelance developer & administrator I personally find that only 25-30% or referrals are so "cold" and inhuman as not to involve anyone I've previously met or communicated with enough to "know" them... to my knowledge, of course

I think as people learn how to figure out whether or not to trust what stangers are telling them better this will improve. The trust metrics on Advogato.org are awesome, and I think there will be a lot more use of such systems in social networks and distributed communities soon - they're quite a bit more robust & reliable than ratings.

Personally I like to use Kuro5hin, Advogato, MoveOn, SourceForge... in general the geek culture is where it's at. So build your own community (by definition not self-serving any more than back-scratching - for the good of the group first, individuals secondarily).

I happily entered the overstuffed "field" of computing after undergrad (chem major) despite obvious drawbacks of current fads, etc. Is there any other emergent culture? Like what? Any others are ancient, and I would argue they're all really the same thing, anyway - collective consciousness, the spirit of humanity, Tao, everything and all that is, whatever you might use to identify the whole of which we are all components.

This culture "knows" several things about ownership, economics and social structure that are clearly lost on alpha role western capitalist societies. Time for philosopher initiates to rule with (actual!) compassion once more! (damn, it's been a long time)
posted by gkr at 7:10 PM on April 7, 2004